Stop Coronavirus now, invest in public healthcare, WHO warns Nigeria

By Ezurike Ugochukwu

Nigeria, has been warned by the World Health Organization(WHO) to stop the spread of the coronavirus now there are still few cases, invest more in the public health interventions as stipulated in WHO guidelines.

The Director-General of WHO, Dr.Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reminded the nation that if stringent measures are not taken, it may be too late, and impossible for the country to control when it grows to community transmission stage.

He said that the country should act now, stop the  virus from spreading by conducting enough testing, identifying those who test positive, isolating them and following up with contacts’ tracing.

Ghebreyesus advised Nigeria to invest more in the public health interventions, adhere strictly to WHO guidelines about COVID-19 to prevent the spread of the novel deadly disease.

According to him, early measures would prevent the disease from growing from sporadic cases to a community transmission that may become harder to contain looking at the population of Nigeria the most populous African nation.

He said Nigeria need to cut the spread now before it’s too late to achieve,  “The problem starts when community transmission starts, when the number of cases builds.

“The growing number of cases means the healthcare system could be overwhelmed,
when that happens, it becomes difficult or almost impossible to quarantine people,” he said.

Though Nigeria has taken some measures by closing schools, crowd control measures and sensitization campaign on hygiene and respiratory etiquettes, including sneezing and coughing away from people which the world body thinks is not enough.

Nigeria presently has 70 confirmed cases of the pandemic out of which only one person has died, and three persons certified free from the virus

25,000 people have died from coronavirus, world over,  while over 550,000 have been infected and more than 127,000 have recovered.

Ghebreyesus insists that if no drastic measures are taken by the Nigerian government, the situation can escalate rapidly and become difficult.