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NEC, NCDC agree to strengthen COVID-19 response across states

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The National Economic Council (NEC) and the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on Thursday agreed to further strengthen COVID-19 response across the states.

The NCDC Director-General, Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu, disclosed this to State House correspondents after the NEC meeting presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Ihekweazu said the meeting was an opportunity to brief the governors on the state of the pandemic in their various states as they had done well in health security, preventing and detecting new cases among other areas.

He said: “We agreed on several measures to strengthen the response further; one of this was to set up fixed sample collection sites in all the states.

“So that going beyond the outbreak response, there will be fixed sample collection sites where people can go to when they think they have COVID-19; mostly likely within the hospital premises and have access to testing.

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“This will make it a lot easier for people to walk in and request a test.’’

The NCDC chief said that members acknowledged the increase in staff capacity among healthcare workers on infection prevention and control.

He added that the governors were briefed on access to personal protective equipment, reagents commodities and the maintenance of a supply chain to all the states in Nigeria.

Ihekweazu said the governors also expressed satisfaction with the work NCDC and the Federal Ministry of Health had done in the efforts to tackle the pandemic in the country.

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