Federal government warns states against competing over COVID-19 figures
- The federal government has warned states against competing amongst themselves over the numbers of COVID-19 cases
- Sani Aliyu, the national coordinator of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19, urged state governments to be transparent about the number of cases
- Aliyu also appealed to state governments to continue supporting emergency operating centres
Following the spread of coronavirus in the country, the federal government has warned states against seeing the number of COVID-19 cases as a competition amongst themselves, Daily Trust reports.
Sani Aliyu, the national coordinator of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on the coronavirus pandemic, who made the appeal at a briefing of the task force on Monday, April 27, in Abuja urged state governments to be transparent about figures of cases.
Aliyu went on to urge state governments to continue supporting the state emergency operating centres and make sure that everybody who needs to be tested for COVID-19 gets it done.
He said: “COVID-19 numbers is not an issue of competition between states. There’s no shame if a state comes out with positive numbers.
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“In order to deal with an epidemic, we need to have transparency in numbers and that transparency is linked to the number of tests. If you do not know the extent of a problem, you’ll not be able to deal with it.
“So I’m appealing to state governments to please continue to support the state emergency operating centres, the state ministry of health and make sure that everybody who needs to be tested for COVID-19 in any state in the country has that opportunity of having the test done.”
The PTF national coordinator further said a number of states still lacked the adequate capacity for isolation, advised them to correct this before the cases continue to go up.
"I’m appealing to state chief executives to please make sure where you do not have adequate isolation facilities to do so. The PTF has already put 300 as per state minimum number of isolation beds that should be available in every state,” he added.
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This development is coming after the Presidential Task Force (PTF) said despite progress so far made to combat the spread of the infection, the country had yet a long ground to cover.
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) and chairman of the (PTF), Boss Mustapha, who stated this on Monday, April 27, at the daily media briefing in Abuja, also said the situation in Kano state was being closely monitored.
The SGF whose speech opened the day’s briefing, re-echoed the charge to all Nigerians to take responsibility for the fight against COVID-19, noting that much more success would be achieved when advisories already issued and other preventive measures were seriously followed.
In other news, President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday, April 27, signed the proclamation order on the general management of Covid-19 in the FCT, Lagos, Ogun, Kano, and other states after easing the imposed lockdown measures.
Buhari who announced the measures to curb the spread of coronavirus during his nationwide broadcast noted that they take effect from Monday, May 4. This was revealed in a statement by Femi Adesina, the president's special adviser on media and publicity.
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