Coronavirus cases in Nigeria have reached another devastating milestone as 1,024 people tested positive for COVID-19, this is according to the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control as of Sunday night, January 10
It brings new figure of the country’s total cases to more than 100,000.
This is coming about 11 months after the country recorded its first infection in an Italian traveler on February 27, 2020.
It was hoped that Nigeria and some of the African countries would be spared by the pandemic in its early stages but since the second wave began in early December, the disease has been spreading ruthlessly, setting new records after months of low numbers that led to a lax on guard to safety and weak enforcement of health protocols.
On Sunday, Nigeria reported from 16 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) 1, 024 new cases pushing the total number of infections in the country to 100, 087.
One in every six persons tested for COVID-19 in Nigeria in the past two weeks tested positive for the virus, indicating how far the virus has spread.
The spike in infections is also leading to fatalities.
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Eight people died from the disease on Sunday, taken the death toll to 1,358 in total and 8 people also died on Saturday on Friday 12 people died from the virus and in the past 23 days, there have been 146 fatalities as a result of COVID-19 complications in Nigeria.
The government has blamed the increasing deaths on later referrals of COVID-19 patients to treatment centres.
The Minister of State for Health, Olorunnimbe Mamora at the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 briefing on Tuesday said caregivers are holding on to suspected cases for too long before presenting them for treatment.
But health experts believe the lowering of guard on safety and the weak enforcement of protocols especially in the country’s major airports in Abuja and Lagos could be responsible for the recent surge, warning that the situation could get worse if citizens keep violating safety protocols.
Significant increase in COVID-19 infections in Nigeria appears imminent this January due to continued violation of safety protocols during the Christmas period.
Active cases in the country rose sharply from about 3,000 about a month ago to over 17,000 due to a rise in new infections.
Of the over 100,000 cases so far, 80,030 patients have been discharged from hospitals after treatment.
The 1,024 new cases were reported from 17 states: Lagos-653, Plateau-63,mBenue-48, Zamfara-45, FCT-42, Rivers-27, Ondo-26, Adamawa-26, Kaduna-22, Edo-18, Ogun-16, Imo-12, Kano-9, Yobe-6, Ekiti-5, Jigawa-4, Osun-2.
Lagos led with 653 new cases on Sunday, more than half of the daily total.
The commercial city is Nigeria’s coronavirus epicentre with a total of over 35,000 confirmed cases and about 252 deaths.
Mr Mamora warned Nigerians against complacency in containing the COVID-19 pandemic as the much-awaited vaccines may not arrive the country as soon as expected.
So far, Nigeria has conducted over a million COVID-19 tests.
