Now that coronavirus is here in Nigeria

AS the first case of Coronavirus has been recorded in Nigeria, more African nations are bracing up to contain the dreaded virus just as the Ogun State government said that 28 persons who were in contact with the Italian national infected with coronavirus have been identified and quarantined.

Governor Dapo Abiodun, who made this disclosure on Friday at a news conference held in Abeokuta, said the affected people would remain in quarantine for the next 14 days.

The governor, flanked by his Commissioner for Health, Dr Tomi Coker and Special Adviser on Communications, Remmy Hazzan, noted that the government would continue with line listing of those who had contact with the 28 people.

Abiodun said the company visited by the Italian had been shut down while two isolation centres had been put in place within the premises.

The governor stated that part of measures to contain the virus was the establishment of a disease surveillance centre in each of the 20 local government areas of the state.

He expressed concern over the time it would take the state to convey test samples of any suspected case from Ogun to the Bio-Security Centre in Lagos, thereby necessitating the upgrade of the isolation unit at the Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital (OOUTH), Sagamu, as containment facility centre.

Abiodun pointed out that Ogun and Lagos states would work together alongside the Federal Ministry of Health to upgrade the facility.

He appreciated the National Centre for Disease Control for paying utmost attention to the state since the case was reported, adding that officials of the Federal Ministry of Health were already on the ground in the state.

The governor said the state government had distributed items to all health facilities in the state for the protection of the workers.

According to him, the government, which is deploying a lot of resources to fight the virus, is sharing an application with health officials to help them in identifying infected persons.

“There is no cause for panic. We are on top of the situation. I am appealing to our people to improve on their personal hygiene. You should not hesitate to alert any nearest health facility in case you identified anyone with coronavirus symptoms,” he added.

The Lagos Commissioner for Health, Professor Akin Abayomi, expressed concern that the disease might be severe in those that had contacts with the Italian. He said the patient, who returned to Nigeria from Italy, has been placed in isolation in Lagos.

Abayomi said, “We will use all the resources made available by the State and the Federal Government to respond to this case. We are working to identify all the contacts of the patient since he arrived in Nigeria.

“Please, be reminded that most people who become infected may experience only a mild illness and recover easily, but it can be more severe in others, particularly the elderly and persons with other underlying chronic illnesses,” he said.

Israeli researchers say vaccine is matter of weeks away

Meanwhile, scientists at the Galilee Research Institute, in Israel known as MIGAL, are adapting its vaccine against the avian coronavirus infectious bronchitis virus, or IBV, to work for the novel coronavirus known as COVID-19.

“Congratulations to MIGAL on this exciting breakthrough. I am confident that there will be further rapid progress, enabling us to provide a needed response to the grave global COVID-19 threat,” said Ofir Akunis, Israel’s minister of science and technology.

The independent research institute, which specialises in the fields of biotechnology, environmental sciences and agriculture, says on its website that its team “includes 80 PhDs and a total of 260 researchers distributed into 53 labs that are managed by seasoned senior group leaders.”

Its vaccine for IBV, a bronchial illness that affects poultry, has already been proven in preclinical trials conducted at Israel’s Veterinary Institute, according to the news outlet.

“Our basic concept was to develop the technology and not specifically a vaccine for this kind or that kind of virus,” said Dr. Chen Katz, MIGAL’s biotech group chief.

“The scientific framework for the vaccine is based on a new protein expression vector, which forms and secretes a chimeric soluble protein that delivers the viral antigen into mucosal tissues by self-activated endocytosis, causing the body to form antibodies against the virus,” he added.

Endocytosis is the process in which substances are brought into cells by surrounding the material with membranes that form vesicles containing the ingested material.

The researchers discovered that the poultry coronavirus is very similar genetically to the human one — and that it uses the same infection method, Katz said.

“All we need to do is adjust the system to the new sequence,” he said. “We are in the middle of this process, and hopefully in a few weeks we will have the vaccine in our hands. Yes, in a few weeks, if it all works, we would have a vaccine to prevent coronavirus.”

The oral vaccine will have to go through a regulatory process, including clinical trials, he noted.

MIGAL CEO David Zigdon said the vaccine could “achieve safety approval in 90 days,” according to the Jerusalem Post.

“Given the urgent global need for a human coronavirus vaccine, we are doing everything we can to accelerate development,” he added.

Akunis said he has instructed his ministry’s director-general to speed up all approval processes.

“We are currently in intensive discussions with potential partners that can help accelerate the in-human trials phase and expedite completion of final-product development and regulatory activities,” he said.

Meanwhile, Israeli company BATM said Thursday it has developed a quick diagnostic kit to test for the coronavirus — and that production was underway at a facility in Rome owned by Adaltis, which produces medical testing devices.

The firm said the kit’s ability to successfully screen those carrying the virus had been verified by several labs and hospitals, adding that the test met criteria set out by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Fears that Surrey GP is UK’s latest coronavirus case

A General Practitioner in Surrey, England, has been taken to one of the NHS’s six specialist centres for infectious diseases amid fears he is the latest British case of coronavirus, the Guardian has been told.

The development is understood to have triggered an urgent investigation to see if any of his patients have the coronavirus too.

The case – which would be the 20th to emerge in the UK – has prompted particular concern among health officials trying to limit the spread of Covid-19.

The GP would routinely have seen scores of patients over the course of the last week before he became ill in the last 24 hours.

His diagnosis has yet to be publicly confirmed by Public Health England (PHE), NHS England or the Department of Health and Social Care.

Public health chiefs are also worried by the unnamed doctor’s diagnosis because his wife is also a GP.

PHE is “contact tracing” everyone with whom either of the couple has been in contact – including all patients they have seen – so they can also be tested for evidence of the virus.

That exercise involves scores of patients as the couple is understood to have been working normally for several days before he was identified as a carrier of the virus.

It is not yet known if his wife has also contracted the virus, which for the first time has claimed the life of a Briton – a passenger on the Diamond Princess Cruise liner.

Public health officials looking into the GP’s case have not yet established how he might have caught the virus but he has not recently visited any of the places abroad where there have been recent outbreaks, such as northern Italy, Tenerife, Iran and China.

Contact tracing of his patients is likely to look into whether anyone he has seen in recent days has been to any of those destinations.

If confirmed, he would be the second GP to contract coronavirus among what are now 20 confirmed cases in the UK. The first, a family doctor in Brighton, and a member of staff at Worthing hospital, also in Sussex, were among the first cases to be identified in Britain earlier this month.

The number of confirmed cases in the UK had jumped from 13 to 19 in the last 24 hours, with four emerging in England and one each in Wales and Northern Ireland. The latest case would bring that total to 20.

Mongolian president, entire delegation quarantined

The Mongolian president and his entire delegation have been put under 14-day quarantine after making a state visit to coronavirus-stricken China.

Khaltmaagiin Battulga visited China to meet President Xi Jinping amid an outbreak of the deadly infection. The emergency apparently was not considered too big a risk to cancel the planned high-profile event, but Mongolian authorities have decided their leader doesn’t get a pass on safety rules.

After returning to Ulaanbaatar on Thursday, he and all of the officials who accompanied him were placed in two-week isolation, the news agency Montsame reported. They were also tested for the coronavirus, the report said, without stating whether any of the tests were positive.

Among the officials included in the quarantine are Mongolia’s foreign minister, its ambassador to China, the national emergencies chief, the president’s chief of staff, and a foreign policy adviser. They will be spending the next two weeks at a resort in an isolated mountainous area of Mongolia, while President Battulga will be accommodated at a clinic in the capital.

While this is likely just a precaution and the Mongolian officials are uninfected, the same cannot be said for some of their counterparts in Tehran. The Iranian VP for women and family affairs, along with the head of the parliament’s security and foreign affairs commission, are among the infected. The country’s former ambassador to the Vatican, Hadi Khosrowshahi, died on Thursday after failing to overcome the virus.
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Basic protective measures against the new coronavirus

COVID-19 is still affecting mostly people in China with some outbreaks in other countries. Most people who become infected experience mild illness and recover, but it can be more severe for others. Take care of your health and protect others by doing the following:

Wash your hands frequently

Regularly and thoroughly clean your hands with an alcohol-based hand rub or wash them with soap and water.

Why? Washing your hands with soap and water or using alcohol-based hand rub kills viruses that may be on your hands.

Maintain social distancing

Maintain at least 1 metre (3 feet) distance between yourself and anyone who is coughing or sneezing.

Why? When someone coughs or sneezes they spray small liquid droplets from their nose or mouth which may contain virus. If you are too close, you can breathe in the droplets, including the COVID-19 virus if the person coughing has the disease.

Avoid touching eyes, nose and mouth

Why? Hands touch many surfaces and can pick up viruses. Once contaminated, hands can transfer the virus to your eyes, nose or mouth. From there, the virus can enter your body and can make you sick.

Practice respiratory hygiene

Make sure you, and the people around you, follow good respiratory hygiene. This means covering your mouth and nose with your bent elbow or tissue when you cough or sneeze. Then dispose of the used tissue immediately.

Why? Droplets spread virus. By following good respiratory hygiene you protect the people around you from viruses such as cold, flu and COVID-19.

If you have fever, cough and difficulty breathing, seek medical care early

Stay home if you feel unwell. If you have a fever, cough and difficulty breathing, seek medical attention and call in advance. Follow the directions of your local health authority.

Why? National and local authorities will have the most up to date information on the situation in your area. Calling in advance will allow your health care provider to quickly direct you to the right health facility. This will also protect you and help prevent spread of viruses and other infections.

UNWTO and WHO Joint Statement on Tourism and COVID-19

As the current outbreak of the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) continues to develop, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) are committed to working together in guiding the travel and tourism sectors’ response to COVID-19.

On 30 January 2020, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak of COVID-19 to be a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and issued a set of Temporary Recommendations. WHO did not recommend any travel or trade restriction based on the current information available. WHO is working closely with global experts, governments and partners to rapidly expand scientific knowledge on this new virus, to track the spread and virulence of the virus, and to provide advice to countries and the global community on measures to protect health and prevent the spread of this outbreak.

Cooperation is key

The tourism sector is fully committed to putting people and their well-being first. International cooperation is vital for ensuring the sector can effectively contribute to the containment of COVID-19. UNWTO and WHO are working in close consultation and with other partners to assist States in ensuring that health measures be implemented in ways that minimize unnecessary interference with international traffic and trade.

Tourism’s response needs to be measured and consistent, proportionate to the public health threat and based on local risk assessment, involving every part of the tourism value chain – public bodies, private companies and tourists, in line with WHO’s overall guidance and recommendations.

UNWTO and WHO stand ready to work closely with all those communities and countries affected by the current health emergency, to build for a better and more resilient future. Travel restrictions going beyond these may cause unnecessary interference with international traffic, including negative repercussions on the tourism sector.

At this challenging time, UNWTO and WHO join the international community in standing in solidarity with affected countries.