Questions about COVID-19 response
Ehanire said the man’s name will not be made public because that is the convention in medical practice. Yet, the Liberian man Sawyer who first brought Ebola to Nigeria seven years ago was publicly identified, including the hospital he went to and the doctor, Dr. Adadevoh, that he infected, leading to her untimely death
It is heart-warming to hear from Minister of Health Dr. Osagie Ehanire that there has been no new case of COVID-19 in Nigeria since the first case of the Italian businessman who flew into the country from Milan.He is being managed at the Infectious Disease Hospital in Yaba, Lagos and is responding to treatment, according to the authorities.
Health authorities said they have since reached out to over 100 people who had contact with the Italian man, travelled with him and stayed in the same hotel. It asked them to remain in self-isolation for 14 days while undergoing daily temperature checks. So far, none of them has tested positive for the virus, we were told.
However, some questions raised by observers and critics regarding the Federal Ministry of Health’s ongoing response to the COVID-19 scare ought to be answered squarely in order to ease public apprehension. For example, government refused to identify the Italian man or any of the 156 passengers on board the aircraft that brought him from Italy. Ehanire said the man’s name will not be made public because that is the convention in medical practice. Yet, the Liberian man Sawyer who first brought Ebola to Nigeria seven years ago was publicly identified, including the hospital he went to and the doctor, Dr. Adadevoh, that he infected, leading to her untimely death. Apparently medical practice has changed since then.
Questions were also asked about the circumstances of the Italian man’s arrival and subsequent movement in Nigeria. Some said he never went to Abeokuta as earlier claimed. However, the cement company Lafarge Africa Plc, of which the Italian businessman is a vendor, said it has quarantined 39 people who were in contact with him.Its cement factory in Ogun State however remains open, Lafarge said.
Government also appeared to have trouble finding the people who travelled with the Italian man. In recent days it appears to have found many “contact cases.” The Minister of Health said in Abuja on Monday that they had reached out to 100 people who had contact with the Italian man. He said they are under self-supervised isolation and have been provided with temperature monitoring tools.“The ministry is working with the Lagos and Ogun state governments to carry contact tracing and other response activities,” he said. He also said, “Currently, the contact tracing of the index case has identified 19 contacts in Lagos, 29 contacts in Ogun, including the driver that picked him up from the airport. There is no fresh case.”
Ehanire said government has so far established isolation centres in four Nigerian cities with international airports, namely Lagos, Abuja, Kano and Port Harcourt. In addition, he said scanners were discretely mounted at the four airports which automatically check a person’s body temperature without the passengers being aware. We however agree with Senate President Ahmad Lawan’s observation that for a scare of this magnitude, four isolation centres are too few.
Even though most Nigerians are by now aware of the COVID-19 danger, public enlightenment efforts should still be stepped up, in particular as to the individual, family and group measures to take for self-protection. By now Nigerians should be scaling down on public ceremonies and other gatherings in order to reduce the risks of the virus’ spread. The government could help in this direction by cancelling many slated public events so that citizens will get the message.