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As COVID-19 Cases Rise, NCDC Boss Cries Out: We’re running Out of Beds!

Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu

Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu

The Director-General of Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, says the country is facing a herculean task to curtail the spread of coronavirus in Lagos, Abuja and Kano State.

Ihekweazu revealed this during the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 daily briefing on Thursday in Abuja.

The NCDC DG said there were inadequate bed spaces in isolation centres to accommodate COVID-19 patients.

According to Ihekweazu, there were only 3,500 bed spaces available in the whole of the country, that is actively tracing over 10,000 contacts and has recorded 1,728 confirmed cases already.

He said, “In response to the question about bed spaces. There is no doubt about that, we are struggling in certain places especially in Lagos. To an extent Kano and Abuja too but the biggest challenge right now is in Lagos where bad spaces are really tight.

“Across the country, we have about 3,500 bed spaces identified as available for COVID-19 but in Lagos, we are really struggling. So, we are going to keep trying to work with them to make more spaces available and ultimately.

“We will always be honest with Nigerians, we are struggling at the moment we might have to adapt that strategy because of the reality we have faced over the next few days and weeks.”

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