*Medical professionals battling to safe lives at the Lagos COVID-19 treatment centre
As the rampaging Coronavirus (COVID-19) continue to devastate the whole world including Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, health authorities have said that four more new cases of COVID-19 have been reported in the country. As at today, the virus has claimed 35,000 lives worldwide. To minimize the effect in Nigeria, the government at 11:00p.m. on Monday March 30, 2020, ordered a total lockdown of Lagos, Ogun State and Abuja.
According to the statistics, three were recorded in Osun State and one in Ogun State. “As at 11:15 a.m. March 31 there are 135 confirmed cases of COVID-19 reported in Nigeria with two deaths,” according to the update by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC). So far in Nigeria, the pandemic has been recorded in 11 states and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
Lagos State, which is Nigeria’s epicentre topped the chart of COVID-19 cases in Nigeria with 81 cases followed by the Federal Capital Territory Abuja with 25 cases. Oyo State followed with eight cases, which sadly includes their hardworking governor, Engineer Seyi Makinde, who tested positive for the virus on Monday. With the four new cases announced on Tuesday, the number of cases in Osun State jumped from one to five while that of Ogun State increased from three to four. Kaduna State has recorded three cases so far including the diminutive governor Nasir El-Rufai.
Enugu, Edo and Bauchi States have two cases each including the state governor, Bala Mohammed while Ekiti, Rivers and Benue States have one confirmed case each. The COVID-19 lockdown announced by the President, Muhammadu Buhari in Lagos, Ogun, and FCT has begun with just a few people moving around but the military has warned that they would enforce total lockdown as directed by the president in his nationwide broadcast on March 29.. Buhari had said in a broadcast that the lockdown would last 14 days and was part of measures to contain the spread of the virus. Reports have it that the Coronavirus has infected over 700,000 people globally and have killed over 35,000. But luckily for Nigeria, only two people have died as a result of COVID-19 as at the time of publishing this story.
