Lagos State government has decentralised testing for coronavirus (COVID-19) in the state, with 26 sample centres located across the 20 local government areas of the state.
Akin Abayomi, Lagos State commissioner for health, said at a COVID-19 media update on Sunday that the state now has 26 centres where samples of suspected cases of coronavirus can be tested.
Oreoluwa Finnih, senior special assistant to Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu on health, had earlier announced this in a tweet.
A breakdown of the locations as released by the state government shows Wright Memorial PHC is the smaple centre for Somolu LGA, Ifako Mini Stadium for Ifako Ijaiye, Ojo PHC for Ojo, and Surulere Local Council secretariat for Surulere LGA.
Furthermore, Kosofe LGA has a smaple centre at Ogudu Area Office, Amuwo-Odofin’s sample centre is located at Amuwo-Odofin LGA Secretariat, Ikorodu has two centres at Ita-Elewa PHC and Igbogbo PHC, Lagos Island has at Igaiduganran PHC, Epe (Epe PHC), Lagos Mainland (Simpson PHC), among others.
The government, however, said visit to the centres is strictly by appointment and not for emergency calls.
Meanwhile, death toll in Lagos arising from COVID-19 complications reached 14 as an 83-year-old woman was reported dead on Sunday.
Abayomi said the aged woman had underlying health issues, urging Lagos residents to continue to observe social distancing and stay home to stop the transmission of COVID-19.
As at Saturday, April 18, total confirmed cases in the state stood at 309 with 94 patients discharged, according to Abayomi.
At the COVID-19 media update on Sunday, Abayomi gave insight into how corpses of COVID-19 victims can be buried, saying families are entitled to claim their dead if they so wish.
“The protocol for managing death from COVID-19 is that the body is decontaminated and then placed in a special body bag or in tube body bags and placed within a coffin and the coffin is sealed. The family is then given the opportunity to come and collect the body for burial,” said Abayomi.
The commissioner explained that the only restriction around burial is that with the current spread of the virus, no large congregation would be allowed at the burial.
He said the gathering at the burial cannot be more than 25 people in total, including the religious members of the ceremony and the grave diggers.
“So family members can carry out the private burial ceremony once we have conducted the proper protocol for decontaminating the body and ensuring that the body is sealed,” he said, adding that there is no existing policy that bans “us from handing the deceased to their family members”.
“It just has to be done in a way that does not expose family members and not break the current law around the number of people to congregate in one place,” he said.
Speaking further on the sample centres, Abayomi said what the government has done is to move sampling stations into the local governments so that those who feel they have any of the symptoms associated with COVID-19 can present themselves to these sampling stations.
“They are not testing centres, they are sampling centres. If you need the criteria for testing, you will be able to receive the counsel from the staff and your sample will be taken,” Abayomi said.
“We are not just testing anybody but there are criteria for testing. You either have the symptoms to meet the case definition or you have been a very close contact to someone that has been confirmed with COVID-19. Your sample will be taken and it will then be sent to one of our accredited testing facilities and those facilities will then perform the test,” he said.
He explained that the strategy was to bring the testing opportunity closer to the people so as to relieve the strain on medical staff in terms of driving through several local governments, and also to create the opportunity for people in the local government areas to present themselves for testing.
This, he said, would help the state get a better idea of what is happening in the community and also facilitate early diagnosis of COVID-19 at the local government level.
Abayomi said at the moment, there are between 30 and 40 ventilators in Lagos, but some of these ventilators are designated for non-COVID patients and the others are designated for COVID-19.
Joshua Bassey & Anthonia Obokoh
