CORONAVIRUS: Senate decries lack of proper screening at Nigerian airports

The Nigerian Senate has expressed dismay that there had not been proper screening of passengers for Coronavirus at airports across the country.

The President of the Nigerian Senate, Ahmad Lawan, who raised this concern on Thursday doubted if the Federal Ministry of Health was putting quality measures in place to ensure there would not be the outbreak of the deadly virus in Nigeria.

To this end, Lawan called on the Senate Committee on Primary Health Care to ensure it liaised with the Health Ministry to intensify screening of passengers at the nation’s airports and seaports.

The Deputy Senate Leader, Senator Ajayi Boroffice had during the lawmakers’s plenary raised a point of order on the supposed failure of health personnel at the airports and seaports to painstakingly screen passengers coming into the country.

The senator told how he was thoroughly screened at a South African airport when he visited the Rainbow country recently.

Boroffice said, “There is no form of any screening of passengers for Coronavirus by Nigerian officials at the airport.

“It is worrisome, situations where travellers coming into the country were not dully screened for the dreaded virus.”

According to the senator, he raised the concern so that the Federal Ministry of Health and other concerned agencies could take note.

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“We must take all the necessary measures at our ports, airports, seaports, to protect our people.

“If anybody is coming from China, he or she should be quarantined not even isolation for two weeks or four weeks, we have to protect the lives of Nigerians,” Lawan said as he commended Boroffice for raising the matter.

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