Oluwole Josiah
The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control(NCDC) on Thursday reported five deaths from Covid-19, with more states recording new infections.
According to the centre’s update as of 28 July 2021, 535 new cases were confirmed, while five persons died of the infection.
The 535 new cases were reported from 18 states- Lagos (219), Akwa Ibom (142), Oyo (47), Rivers (17), Jigawa (13), Edo (13), Ekiti (11), Bayelsa (11), Ondo(10), Osun (9), Plateau (8), Ogun (7), Kaduna (7), Kano (5),FCT (5), Imo (4), Gombe (4), and Nasarawa (3)
So far, 172,263 cases have been confirmed, 164,886 cases have been discharged and 2,139 deaths have been recorded in 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory.
The figure for new cases now surpasses Tuesday’s earlier highest record of 404, which was recorded on Tuesday.
World Health Organisation(WHO) had earlier warned that with the new Delta variant of the virus now well endemic, Africa countries were likely to witness a spike in the number of cases, especially with the Eid Kabir celebration which was concluded last week, where there were large gatherings and poor adherence to Covid-19 prevention protocols.
This is coming after months of low infection rate, and when much of the guards had been let down.
Infection rates have largely concentrated in Lagos, and the FCT. However, other states such as Oyo, Kaduna and Rivers States have also had their fare share of high infection rate.
Although, no death was recorded from the disease on Tuesday, the record of five deaths portends a dangerous turn in the current situation and health experts fear the rising numbers could put the nation on other risk of a lockdown which might be detrimental to the already economy.
Nigerian government had put the figure of the number of tested samples at about 2.4 million, in a country of about 200 million people.