Moshood Adebayo, Lagos
Lagos State Governor Babatunde Sanwo Olu, has lamented the rising cases of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), disclosing that 1,683 cases of the disease have been reported in the state.
In his eleventh update on the status of the pandemic in the state, Sanwo-Olu, in his capacity as the Incident Commander of the State’s response task force, disclosed that 448 patients have been treated and discharged, while 33 have lost their lives to the virus-related disease.
“This week has been unprecedented in terms of the numbers of newly confirmed cases in Lagos State. As of Friday, May 8, 2020, we had 1,683 confirmed cases. Of that number, 448 have been treated and discharged, while we have, sadly, lost 33 persons,” the governor stated.
“In the six days since my last address to you, while we have seen a 32% increase in the number of fatalities in Lagos State and a 62% increase in the number of confirmed cases, we have also seen a remarkable 100% increase in the number of persons who have fully recovered.
“This trend of recoveries is very encouraging, and we believe it will continue at this rate. It gives us some of the much-needed confidence to face the difficult days and weeks ahead.”
While decrying the attitudes of some Lagosians to precautions and guidelines to stave off the pandemic, Governor Sanwo-Olu said: “Let the numbers we have seen this week stand as a warning to all of you, the good people of Lagos State. What we are seeing is child’s play compared to what we could be seeing if we continue to be irresponsible.”
The governor who admitted that the State was in the community transmission stage of the infection, added that that the only way to detect new cases was to scale-up testing.
He revealed that there are now four testing facilities in the state and expressed gratitude to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and other partners involved in the fight against the disease.
On his administration’s efforts at ramping up testing, the governor said: “Our combined lab capacity is at about 850 tests daily. This is easily scalable to 1,500 and 2,000 subject to the availability of extraction kits, considering the acute global shortage.
The governor also disclosed that the State had paid for over 20,000 extraction kits and has placed an order for another 20,000 as it aims to test at least 120,000 in the next 60 days.