COVID-19: We Now Have Capacity To Conduct 3,000 Tests Daily – NCDC DG

The Director-General of the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC), Chikwe Iheweazu, has said that Nigeria now has a testing capacity of 3,000 persons per day.

At a briefing by the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 on Wednesday, the NCDC boss reiterated that testing capacity had improved but the only bottleneck left is how to get the right samples in for testing.

“We now have the capacity of testing 3,000 (people) per day. That capacity is not being fully utilized. That is why I focused on Lagos State and the FCT and the efforts they are making to get more people tested and more samples in,” he said.

“We’ve improved testing capacity. The bottleneck now is getting the samples from the right people.”

According to the NCDC boss, the government is setting up 20 healthcare facilities in Lagos which will be announced once they are open.

Meanwhile, the government also commenced community testing in Abuja on Wednesday.

“In Abuja, in certain communities, we are going door to door and collecting samples from people who have an acute respiratory infection… collecting samples from people that think they have an acute respiratory infection,” Ihekweazu said as he urged members of the public to call the health care lines if they suspect symptoms.

The NCDC boss also gave some key recommendations regarding the use of facemasks as a protective gear.

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According to him, how the facemask is worn or handled while it is being worn is more important than actually just wearing it.

Apart from learning the right way to wear it, he also advised that in the absence of the medical masks, Nigerians can put on any other type of improvised but safe masks.

The full recommendations are on the NCDC’s website.