The Anambra Government has declared eight more COVID-19 patients recovered and fit to go home.
The state’s Commissioner for Health, Dr. Vincent Okpala, disclosed this in a statement on Sunday in Awka, saying the patients were certified healthy after they tested negative for the virus after treatment.
According to him, Anambra has successfully treated and discharged 11 COVID-19 patients out of a total of 14 confirmed cases in the state.
Of the remaining three cases, the commissioner confirmed that one escaped to Lagos, while the other two sadly died of the disease.
He said that the 11 patients, who recovered, including the index case were treated in the state’s Protective Care Centres and discharged in record time.
“The battle against the virus has raged on but the state government has deployed strategies to ensure its containment,” he noted.
According to Okpala, the community search programme has been boosted by the presence of new testing centres in the state.
He said the feat was as a result of an effective Public Private Partnership initiative between the state government and a Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC)-certified private testing laboratory centre in Nnewi.
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He said however, that the state would soon expand the scope of testing for Coronavirus as the mega PCR Laboratory at Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu Teaching Hospital (COOTH), Amaku, is set to be confirmed as a testing centre.
“We have got the test kits. The machines there are among the best in the country that use special test kits,’’ he added.
The commissioner said the COOUTH testing facility had five Abbott m2000 platforms, each of which could run 94 tests per cycle.
When fully operational, he said, tests of five cycles in 24 hours could be carried out, translating to 470 tests a day per machine.
“If you were to dedicate the five machines to COVID-19 testing, you will hit 2,350 tests per day.
“NCDC is the only body authorised to import these test kits into Nigeria and it has a lot of challenges getting the kits because of scarcity and logistics.
“But for the determination and persistence of Gov. Willie Obiano, we have finally achieved a breakthrough,” Okpala stated.
