COVID-19: Sokoto records two new cases

Sokoto State has, on Sunday, recorded two new cases of coronavirus according to the official Twitter handle of the state ministry of health.

The two new cases confirmed on Sunday has now taken the total number of active case in the state to four cases.

According to the statement, the state now has 158 confirmed cases in the state since the first index case from a total number of 1,383 samples test.

A total number of 1,225 from the total samples were returned negative while another 70 samples result are still pending.

Also, while a total number of 138 patients have been successfully treated and discharged, another 16 patients had died.

Tribune Online recalled that the state has not recorded any positive case of COVID-19 in the last few weeks until on Saturday when the first case of two was discovered.

Meanwhile, to create more awareness on the reality of COVID-19 and why measures should be taken to prevent it, the state ministry of health has embarked on community surveillance.

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According to the state Commissioner for Health, Dr Muhammed Ali Inname, the State Government is intensifying active case finding across the state with a target to test thousands of people in the next 6 weeks.

Inname, who is also the state chairman on tasks force against covid-19 described the ‪community surveillance as a key for the prompt identification, isolation and treatment of #COVID19 cases, to slow the spread of the virus‬.

“Being a new disease means the 2019 Coronavirus (COVID-19) presents a lot of uncertainties as scientists, health workers and agencies at the frontline try to respond and learn simultaneously.

“While the uncertainties have caused panic and even stigma, it is always best to be guided by science. Public health institutions like the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) have been coordinating the response, issuing guidelines and defining the testing criteria for COVID-19.

“As a response strategy to the COVID-19 outbreak in Nigeria, the Sokoto State Government through the State Ministry of Health and NCDC commenced the scaling up of testing across the state. The strategy prioritises testing as a way to stop the spread of the virus by identifying, tracing and isolating positive cases.

“The active case finding in communities will also help quickly identify asymptomatic transmission (people who are infected with COVID-19, but show no symptoms while they are infectious to other people).

“The public health department already had an Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) set up by the NCDC, and this helped to quickly activate the response in Sokoto State.”

He further averred that; “Community members are going to be tested and documented to know if they have any respiratory illnesses before they are handed sample collection materials to proceed to the sample collection area.

“Physical distancing is maintained while documenting and pre-screening community members. Proper documentation is very important in the process in case there is a need to follow up if a test sample turns positive. The forms are carefully assigned identification numbers with other necessary information from the community members.

“A health worker fully clothed in Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) sets up and waits in another corner of the testing site to collect samples from community members after their documentation and pre-screening.

“A nasal swab is carefully done to collect samples for COVID 19 testing. The sample containers are already labelled at the documentation stage, so after collection, the health worker covers and places them in a sample collection tube for transportation to the NCDC National Reference Laboratory in Gaduwa. This helps minimise contact with the sample once collected.”

He urged residents of the state to cooperate with the team in order to stay safe and get to their health status.

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Sokoto records two new cases

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Sokoto records two new cases