The Lagos State Government has predicted drastic decline in the number of COVlD-19 cases in the state by November this year.
The state government divulged this at the Ministerial Press Briefing to commemorate Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s one year in office.
The state government has also concluded arrangements with the 57 flagship Primary Healthcare Centres (PHCs) across the state to embark on monitoring of patients with asymptomatic, mild and moderate cases of the virus who it hoped to confine to homecare soon.
The Commissioner for Health, Prof. Akin Abayomi, who made this announcement, said: “I is difficult to predict when the pandemic will end in Nigeria because this depends on a lot of factors. But in the next four to six months (between September and November), we will see sharp decline in number of cases in the country. This will signal that we are coming towards defeating the outbreak.”
The commissioner added: “We are watching what is happening across the world and using the pattern of the outbreak in different environments to try and reach some kind of modeling pattern. This will tell us when it will peak, and then when it will finally end.”
Abayomi noted that by the end of July, Lagos was likely to reach between 90,000 and 120, 000 cases of COVlD-19. “These figures do not signify a peak period for the state”.
Because of this projection, he continued that Lagos was ramping up its testing capacity. He emphasised: “We are currently doing 2000 testing every day, and this represents the highest in the country”.
Of the 90,000 projected cases, the commissioner highlighted: “Don’t forget about 95 per cent of the persons will be asymptomatic or have mild symptoms. Only five per cent will require serious or intensive attention. It is this small percentage we are worried about, and it is the ones we will like to manage in our isolation centres because we hope to give them close medical monitoring”.
Abayomi said while those who are asymptomatic or with mild to moderate symptoms the state would confine in their own homes, they would use thr PHC platform to deliver COVID-19 response to this category of cases.
“We have been revitalising our primary healthcare structure, and we are in the process of cascading management of the disease at primary healthcare levels. We are going to do that through our 57 flagship facilities,” he added.
He further noted that the state’s primary healthcare system had carried out comprehensive assessment of no fewer than 329 PHCs, saying that it was focused on the level of functionality and geographical positioning system of the PHCs to identify gaps for service improvement efforts.
“We are not unmindful of the challenges facing PHC system. This is the reason we embarked on the assessment exercise as part of our plan to effect major and lasting transformations that will make access to healthcare facilities at the grassroots hitch free,” he stated.
“Equipped with knowledge of identified gaps, the administration of Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu in the last one year embarked on the construction and renovation of 39 PHCs across all 57 local government and local council development areas to bridge the gaps; 23 of these PHCS are completed and ready for commissioning while others are at various stages of completion”, he said.
According to Abayomi, the comprehensive assessment was a collaborative effort with two nongovernmental organisations; Health Assist and PharmAccess Foundation to improve the quality of service delivery at PHCs across the state.
Abayomi added that the Sanwo-Olu led administration had constructed and delivered five Medical Porta cabins to five PHCs as part of its infrastructural upgrade drive for improved service delivery done in collaboration with Rotary International.
The commissioner, therefore, called for more synergy among the ministry, the local government authorities and National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) to have a robust and viable service delivery at the PHC level. “It would only amount to an exercise in futility if all stakeholders work at vanance”.
…
