Nigeria has recorded 260 new cases of COVID-19, bringing to 12,486 the total number of confirmed cases in the country. Announcing this Sunday, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) said Abia recorded 67 new cases, Federal Capital Territory (FCT) 40, Lagos 38, Ogun 19, Gombe 16, Edo 14, Imo nine, Kwara, Nasarawa, Katsina and Borno eight each, Kaduna six, Bauchi five, Ekiti four, while Niger, Ondo, Plateau, Sokoto and Kano two each. It said: “Nigeria has recorded 12,486 cases of COVID-19. 3,959 persons have been discharged while 354 have unfortunately lost their lives.”
The rate of COVID-19 infection in Lagos State, the epicentre of the pandemic in Nigeria, may be on the decline as the state, for the first time in three months, recorded its first sharp drop yesterday. The slump in the state’s infection rate came just as the federal government has intensified efforts in finding ways of dealing with the virus as it turned to the Asian nation of Bangladesh for drugs to treat COVID-19.
Lagos State has consistently been topping the chart of fresh COVID-19 cases since it recorded the first incidence on February 27, with the nation’s index case. It recorded its highest number of cases in a day on May 30 with 378 out of the 553 confirmed cases nationwide coming from Lagos.
This was followed by 256 cases on May 27, out of the 389 incidences recorded nationwide while on May 29, 254 of the 387 cases recorded all over the country were confirmed positive for the virus. According to NCDC data, Lagos State so far has 5,767 confirmed cases with 4,756 patients on admission, 1,025 treated and discharged while 67 have died.
Meanwhile, Nigeria will today take delivery of drugs it purchased from Bangladesh for the treatment of COVID-19 patients. Dhaka Tribune, in a report on its online edition yesterday, reported that a special flight with the medicines, medical supplies, and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) left Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, last night for Lagos.
The paper said the emergency flight was loaded with a consignment of Remdesivir and Remivir, two drugs believed to be helpful in the treatment of COVID-19, which were hurriedly purchased by the Nigerian government as the country’s cases of the virus continue to rise. The report said the drugs, among others, would be used in treating a governor, whose identity was not disclosed.
According to the report, Nigeria’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Geoffrey Onyeama, telephoned his Bangladeshi counterpart, AK Abdul Momen, on Saturday night to seek assistance, including permission for its emergency plane to land in Dhaka in preparations for evacuating the medical supplies. The plane, it was learnt, landed at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport at about 5pm yesterday and departed for Nigeria with medicines within a short time.
Apart from the medicines, a small quantity of protective personal equipment (PPE) and other medical supplies are said to be part of the consignment on its way to Nigeria. www.www.aso.rocks search engine also learnt that subject to the effectiveness of the drugs, the Nigerian government intends to procure more medicines and medical supplies from the South Asian country. Efforts to speak to Onyeama were abortive as he neither responded to calls and text messages sent to his mobile phone.