Virus Cases Declining Since January, Says NCDC

*Travellers arrested for presenting fake lab certificate
*Kano infection: Yellow, Lassa fever ruled out as cause

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has announced that
the number of COVID-19 cases have continued to decline across the
country since January 25.

It, however, stressed that it will continue to scale up testing,
risk communication and all the other response activities.

The agency urged Nigerians to take responsibility for their
COVID-19 test results by getting tested in accredited laboratories
across the country.

The NCDC said many travellers were turned back and handed over
to security agents for presenting fake COVID-19 test results.

NCDC Director-General Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu made these known in
Abuja during the briefing of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on
COVID-19.

He said: “In Nigeria, COVID-19 cases have continued to decline.
However, our response activities continue. We have seen a decline
in the number of cases now across eight consecutive weeks. However,
we are still scaling testing, pushing hard on risk communication,
and all the other activities. We will continue to do so every
single day and every week over the next few months.

“We have been working with many states to roll out rapid
diagnostic test kits and we are happy with the progress being made.
We urge all Nigerians to continue to adhere to the public health
measures in order to maintain the gains that we have made.

“Concerning the verification platform for test results for
travellers, that platform is now live. Last week, many intending
travellers were turned back and handed over to security agencies
because they were trying to travel with fake lab results.
Sometimes, these results were procured by agents, but to be honest,
everyone has to take responsibility for the test results in your
hands.

“We advise everyone travelling to spare themselves the
inconvenience and embarrassment by doing the test in one of the
accredited labs, which you can find on our website. Before you
travel, please check the destination country’s requirements. If it
includes a PCR negative test, do this in any of the accredited labs
and you will get a result that is verifiable through any of the
airlines.”

Concerning the strange infections in Kano State, Ihekweazu said:
“We are also responding to an incident in Kano State, where they
have been a cluster of cases of undefined illness. Most cases have
had fever, jaundice and some abdominal pain. We have ruled out the
more common causes of these from an infectious disease point of
view – yellow fever, Lassa.

“Now, we are looking at a few other options of what has been
causing these, but we have a team in Kano right now working with
colleagues in the Federal Ministry, National Agency for Food and
Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and a few other agencies
working together to get to the bottom of that particular
cluster.

“The respiratory infection that has killed the most number of
people till date is a disease that we all know called tuberculosis
(TB). The 24th of March is the World Tuberculosis Day, a day to
raise awareness on this important disease that continues to affect
millions of Nigerians, but a disease that many of us do not think
as important anymore.

“We must continue to focus on prevention, early detection, and
response to this disease. We have been working very closely with
the National TB programme in strengthening TB surveillance and to
make sure that we build on some of the human resources and
investments that were made in COVID-19 to support TB. Also, realise
that all the GeneXpert machines that we have been using for
COVID-19 actually came from the TB programme and our challenge as a
country is to make sure that all these resources work across board
to support our infectious disease response all together.”

*Travellers arrested for presenting fake lab certificate
*Kano infection: Yellow, Lassa fever ruled out as cause

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has announced that
the number of COVID-19 cases have continued to decline across the
country since January 25.

It, however, stressed that it will continue to scale up testing,
risk communication and all the other response activities.

The agency urged Nigerians to take responsibility for their
COVID-19 test results by getting tested in accredited laboratories
across the country.

The NCDC said many travellers were turned back and handed over
to security agents for presenting fake COVID-19 test results.

NCDC Director-General Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu made these known in
Abuja during the briefing of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on
COVID-19.

He said: “In Nigeria, COVID-19 cases have continued to decline.
However, our response activities continue. We have seen a decline
in the number of cases now across eight consecutive weeks. However,
we are still scaling testing, pushing hard on risk communication,
and all the other activities. We will continue to do so every
single day and every week over the next few months.

“We have been working with many states to roll out rapid
diagnostic test kits and we are happy with the progress being made.
We urge all Nigerians to continue to adhere to the public health
measures in order to maintain the gains that we have made.

“Concerning the verification platform for test results for
travellers, that platform is now live. Last week, many intending
travellers were turned back and handed over to security agencies
because they were trying to travel with fake lab results.
Sometimes, these results were procured by agents, but to be honest,
everyone has to take responsibility for the test results in your
hands.

“We advise everyone travelling to spare themselves the
inconvenience and embarrassment by doing the test in one of the
accredited labs, which you can find on our website. Before you
travel, please check the destination country’s requirements. If it
includes a PCR negative test, do this in any of the accredited labs
and you will get a result that is verifiable through any of the
airlines.”

Concerning the strange infections in Kano State, Ihekweazu said:
“We are also responding to an incident in Kano State, where they
have been a cluster of cases of undefined illness. Most cases have
had fever, jaundice and some abdominal pain. We have ruled out the
more common causes of these from an infectious disease point of
view – yellow fever, Lassa.

“Now, we are looking at a few other options of what has been
causing these, but we have a team in Kano right now working with
colleagues in the Federal Ministry, National Agency for Food and
Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and a few other agencies
working together to get to the bottom of that particular
cluster.

“The respiratory infection that has killed the most number of
people till date is a disease that we all know called tuberculosis
(TB). The 24th of March is the World Tuberculosis Day, a day to
raise awareness on this important disease that continues to affect
millions of Nigerians, but a disease that many of us do not think
as important anymore.

“We must continue to focus on prevention, early detection, and
response to this disease. We have been working very closely with
the National TB programme in strengthening TB surveillance and to
make sure that we build on some of the human resources and
investments that were made in COVID-19 to support TB. Also, realise
that all the GeneXpert machines that we have been using for
COVID-19 actually came from the TB programme and our challenge as a
country is to make sure that all these resources work across board
to support our infectious disease response all together.”