NCDC: 91 percent contacts of COVID-19 patients have been traced

Chikwe Ihekweazu, director-general of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), says 91 percent of confirmed contacts of COVID-19 patients have been identified.

As of March 30, 2020, more than 6,000 people were being traced in Lagos and Abuja over their contact with COVID-19 patients.

At the media briefing of the presidential task force on COVID-19 on Friday, Ihekweazu said as of April 9, the centre had been able to track a good number of the contacts.

“We can confirm that we know and are following up 91 percent, as at yesterday, of all the contacts of all the confirmed cases,” he said.

“So, as at yesterday, we had identified and are following up, every day, 91 percent of all the contacts of confirmed cases that were confirmed up till the end of yesterday.

“We are seeing some early indication of a community transmission. That is why the last time I presented these figures, for about 30 percent of patients, we haven’t quite figured out from whom they got that infection. That is an early indicator of community spread, and we are working extremely hard right now. That’s the purpose of the lockdown.”

In March, President Muhammadu Buhari ordered a two-week lockdown in Lagos, Ogun and the federal capital territory as a measure to contain the spread of the virus.

The lockdown, Ihekweazu had said, would allow the NCDC teams have access to the contacts that reside around the areas affected by the lockdown. He had said any time they record a new case, they add about 50 to 60 contacts that they then have to follow every single day for 14 days.

As of 10pm on April 10, 2020, Nigeria had recorded 305 confirmed COVID-19 cases.