Nigerian govt monitoring new strain of COVID-19 –PTF

The Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 has disclosed that the Federal Government of Nigeria is monitoring the new strain of COVID recently discovered in the United Kingdom.

This was disclosed on Wednesday by the National Coordinator of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19, Sani Aliyu, who said during the daily COVID-19 briefing in Abuja that the PTF was in touch with Professor Christian Happi, and another scientist, Ify Aniebo, both of who carried out studies that discovered UK’s “lineage B.1.1.7” mutant variant of the coronavirus.

According to Aliyu, the PTF has reached out to Professor Happi to seek additional clarifications with regards to this and are also talking to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).

Aliyu said; “We have reached out to Professor Happi to seek additional clarifications with regards to this and we are also talking to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, NCDC. What is really vital at this stage is to immediately do sequencing. I know the sequencing that Professor Happi’s group has done in the past involved about 250 samples, so that’s really low.

READ ALSO: Nigerians to get free COVID-19 vaccine – PTF

“What we need to do and most of the things he did were in August or September, so we are much further down the line now and we need to make sure that we sequence as many outlets as we have now.”

He further noted that it was not unusual that coronavirus strains replicate very quickly even as he pointed out that the new UK variant is now found in other countries.

Aliyu added; “Just to allay public anxiety, the strain that has been described in the UK and also now in South Africa and in Australia and in some other countries, what has been shown is that it is more transmissible based on grove studies.

“But there’s no human epidemiological link that suggests that it is more deadly at the moment and certainly, with coronaviruses, they always tend to change, that’s why if you catch a common cold for instance and you get better, the next day if you see someone with a cold, you are just as likely to go down with it.

“They are strains that continue to replicate very quickly, so it’s not surprising that we have a new strain that is being described at the moment. But it’s still early in the day, yet in terms of the science and even within the UK, there’s still a lot of debate as to how different it is from previous strains.

“We are not trying to say we should ignore the problem, we had a very long discussion on Tuesday at the PTF, a debate that lasted well over an hour with different aspects being looked at and we’ll continue to monitor this very closely. We’ve already asked Professor Happy to provide us with additional clarification because they’ve been working for the NCDC as well,” he noted.

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