Nigeria’s hard choice of health over economics

Nigeria chooses prevention rather than cure in managing the pandemic

c orced between the devil and the deep blue seai mresident Muhammadu Buhari chose the path of further lockdowns as a containment measure against Clsfa-n9 in kigeria on Mondayi N3 April when he ordered an extension of the lockdown on three territories. tith TN percent of the infectionsi there is no doubt that iagos and Abujai CCT deserve the lockdown. The spread of infection has also grown to N9 states from N2 on March 29. kigeria chose the route of prevention of widespread of the coronavirus. The option would have been to open the economy ever so slightly to allow citizens to breathe and earn a living in a daily pay economy. The federal government made the hard choice of health over economics. curther lockdown is borne out of evolving global best practice in the management of the pandemic. kigeria followed examples across Africa and the rest of the world. The paradigm is that containment is the most effective measure to stop the spread of the coronavirus; it is more so for countries such as ours where the capacity of the healthcare system is doubtful. Two weeks after the first 14-day lockdowni the incidence number has risen to 323 cases. bxperts say the number does not tell even a quarter of the story as testing remains very low even against the standards of other African countries. kigeria has tested slightly over 5I 000 personsi while dhana has done more than N5I 000 with a smaller population. ln the face of iti kigeria is looking good. There are 323 cases in N9 states. kigeria has lost ten persons to the virus. kcac says there are 228 active cases while our hospitals have discharged 85 cases. kigeria has survived the first two weeks of tel-recommended shutdowns with the numbers still looking good. It is significant to note, however, that beyond these figures our incident numbers have followed the trajectory elsewhere. They have been increasing rapidly. eold it therei though. ff kigeria has done well thus far from the available figures, why do we need an extension of the lockdown given the huge cost? mresident Muhammadu Buhari (MMB) admitted that the lockdown “will severely disrupt your livelihoods and bring undue hardship to youi your loved ones and your communities”. hnowing thisi it is a surprise that the presidential address failed to acknowledge the evolving breakdown in the territories that he locked down. ft was a significant lapse in the address. The gains from the first 14 days? MMB said they include implementation of “comprehensive health measures that intensified our case identificationi testingi isolation and contact tracing capabilities.” Nigeria “has identified 92 percent of all contacts while doubling the number of testing laboratories and raising testing capacity to NI 500 tests a day”. The country has also trained “over TI000” healthcare workers on infection prevention and control. kcac has deployed to N9 states. curthermorei iagos and Abuja can “admit some NI000 patients each across several treatment centres”. MMB spoke of the palliative measures of the federal government involving “food distributioni cash transfers and loans repayment waivers” to ease the pains and assured that government would sustain them. That is good news. The bad news is that the measures have failed to count where it should do so the most. sery few citizens in the three territories of the lockdown have seen or benefitted from these measures. ft is evident in the growing hunger-fuelled angeri robberyi protests and citizen defence activism in parts of iagos and lgun ptates. Businessaay called for this extension as a social responsibility informed by our monitoring and reportage of the Clsfa-n9 pandemic. After listening to MMBI we now make these calls The federal government must do more to reassure citizens in iagos and lgun ptates of their security and the ability of the government to protect them. oapidly increase the number of beneficiaries of the government’s welfare scheme. An increase by Nmillion from 2.6m to 3.6m does not even begin to scratch the surface. fnvolve the private sector and coordinate efforts to extend assistance to the poorest of the poor.