As the number of COVID -19 cases confirmed in Nigeria surpasses 12,000 and the death toll hit 361, the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 (PTF) revealed it is possible the country is starting to experience the pandemic.
The PTF disclosed that a lot of Nigerians were avoiding being tested, as such, there is low testing ratio to the country’s population.
The PTF made this known at the House of Representatives yesterday when PTF members appeared before a joint committee of the House to give account on how funds allocated and donated to the war against the pandemic was utilized.
The Chairman of the PTF who also happens to be the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, expressed some uncertainties over the pandemic and urged the lawmakers to help spread the campaign to their constituencies.
He said, “I must say that the virus is still very dangerous. We have not peaked; we have to meticulously plan. There is no timeline; that is why money is not being thrown at it just because it has been released.
“We don’t know how long this will take us. Even the budget that the National Coordinator mentioned is for a period of six months. We do not know how long it will take us. But by the grace of God, we shall overcome.
“There is no medicine or vaccine for this. The humanity is simply overwhelmed by it. Everything has been turned upside down. Today, we are all masked up. We never used to know it like this. Please, honourable members, there is a lot you can do for us; a lot of legislative actions that can be taken, looking into the future. We are dealing with it today; the next pandemic must not catch us unawares. We must prepare for it.”
Meanwhile, the Director General of Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, in his response to a question on whether the PTF had a projected figure for cases to determine when Nigeria has gotten to the peak of the pandemic, said that the country was just entering it.
Also, Ihekweazu dismissed the claims that the NCDC had spent millions of Naira on text messages to educate Nigerians.
He said: “We are still in the middle of a very, very bad outbreak. In fact, it is most likely that we are at the beginning of a very bad outbreak. This is the honest truth. And as we dig into the details of what we have done, I really crave your indulgence to please, bear in mind that we do this work together, because we really have a collective responsibility to our people.
“The SMS story was of course not true. We will never spend that amount. In fact, all the SMS everybody receives are free, courtesy of the large telcos in the country. We have not paid a dime for SMS. Right now, we have tested less than 100,000. In the country at the moment, we have capacity to test over 200,000.”
