₦airaland Forum

The Federal Government has directed civil servants from Grade level 14 and above to resume on Monday. The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Folashade Yemi-Esan, in a circular on Thursday, said the Federal secretariat complexes had been decontaminated. She said efforts were ongoing to decontaminate other public offices.

The circular reads: “Further to Mr President’s broadcast on a phased and gradual easing of the lockdown measures occasioned by COVID-19, officers on GL 14 and above and those in essential services are hereby directed to resume work with effect from Monday, 4th of May, 2020 in the first instance.“

“Offices are to open three times a week – Monday, Wednesday and Friday – and close at 2:00pm on each day.” The circular further advised affected officers to limit the number of visitors they receive while hand- washing facilities should be located at every strategic location within their office premises.

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/fg-orders-civil-servants-to-resume-monday.html

Director-General, Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Chikwe Ihekweazu, says Nigeria is desperately in need of more ribonucleic acid COVID-19 test kits. In a tweet yesterday, the NCDC boss said [b]this became important as the country expanded testing for the virus.

We’re desperately looking for more RNA extraction kits as we expand #COVID19 testing

Product: Total viral RNA extraction kits (preferably spin column and with a lysis buffer)

Manufacturers: Qiagen, ThermoFischer, SeeGene, Inqaba, LifeRiver etc.

https://mobile.twitter.com/Chikwe_I/status/1254392295572504577

good one

hmm

Economic and business experts have warned that continued lockdown of activities in the country will hurt the economy and severely affect livelihoods. An industrialist, Dr. Anene Somadina, told Daily Trust on Sunday that another lockdown extension would bring immense hardship to the masses and they would likely ignore the government order and law enforcement agencies would have difficulty enforcing compliance due to the number of violations. Dr. Somadina, who is the Vice President of the Abuja Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) in charge of Commerce, said the more effective approach should be to open up the economy and allow people to fend for themselves but that government should insist on some rules.

“The government should insist on social distancing and wearing of masks, especially given that government palliatives are not adequate. This is most appropriate considering the fact that most Nigerians live on daily income,” he said. An economist, Tope Fasua, said the recent shutdown is likely to cause problems for many businesses. “Goods are acquiring demurrage at the ports and if the lockdown persists, many importers will simply abandon the goods, and many will go bankrupt,” he said. Fasua made a case for the federal government to reopen the economy and adopt alternative approaches to stem the spread of COVID-19.

He said the lockdown must be halted to save lives and livelihood and recommended the setting up of a war room to strategize deeply on the next steps to take. “The expectation that millions of us will fall dead, will only be realized when they further impoverish us (or we end up impoverishing ourselves) more than we already are today,” he said. Similarly, the Atedo Peterside-led think tank on COVID-19 advised the federal and state governments to allow economic activities resume cautiously across the country.

The group, led by the chairman and vice chairman of Anap Foundation COVID-19 Think Tank, Atedo Peterside and Abubakar Siddique Mohammed respectively, said the current compulsory lockdown across the country had failed. The think tank was established on 22 March, 2020, to respond to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and has 18 members drawn from across the six geopolitical zones and the diaspora (Germany and USA). “It is time to review the strategy, as it is clear that compulsory lockdowns (as implemented by our own security agencies) are not working.

Food has become a lot more expensive in various urban centres, as transportation costs have soared due to rising security obstacles, arbitrary closure of inter-state borders and other supply chain disruptions,” they said. The think tank said restricted market days and curfews often result in needless overcrowding thereby negating adherence to social distancing. “We believe there is a need to change direction from a compulsory lockdown to an intelligent lockdown (as practiced by a few countries) which largely thrives on voluntary actions by an informed populace,” the group advised.

Members recommended an end to the compulsory lockdowns and intensification of public enlightenment and awareness of the importance of social distancing in public and in public transportation (with rules that prevent overcrowding), wearing masks, improve sanitation and provision of water in public places to facilitate washing of hands.

They further recommended that suspension of large public, social and religious gatherings should continue until further notice and schools should remain closed while those who can, should work from home. They also asked the federal government to make arrangements for Nigerians trapped abroad to return home.

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/further-lockdown-will-hurt-economy-experts.html

Saudi Arabia on Sunday partially eased a 24-hour curfew in place to combat the coronavirus pandemic, except in hotspots including the Muslim holy city of Mecca. The curfew will be relaxed between 9am and 5pm and malls and retailers will be allowed to reopen in all regions of the kingdom until May 13, the official Saudi Press Agency reported. But a round-the-clock lockdown will be maintained in some areas including Mecca, which has reported the kingdom’s highest number of infections in recent days despite being sealed off. Many countries around the Middle East and North Africa have announced a similar easing of lockdown restrictions as Muslims mark the holy fasting month of Ramadan.

Saudi Arabia, which has reported the highest number of infections in the Arab world, is scrambling to limit the spread of the disease at home. On Saturday the health ministry said deaths from the respiratory illness had risen to 136, while confirmed infections rose to 16,299 with 2,215 people reported to have recovered from the illness. Last month, Saudi Arabia suspended the year-round “umrah” pilgrimage over fears of the coronavirus pandemic spreading in Islam’s holiest cities.

Authorities are yet to announce whether they will proceed with this year’s hajj, scheduled for the end of July, but they have urged Muslims to temporarily defer preparations for the annual pilgrimage. Last year, some 2.5 million faithful travelled to Saudi Arabia from across the world to participate in the hajj, which Muslims are obliged to perform at least once in their lives if able.

The Arab world’s biggest economy has also closed cinemas, malls and restaurants and halted flights as it attempts to contain the virus. King Salman has warned of a “more difficult” fight ahead against the virus, as the kingdom faces the economic impact of virus-led shutdowns and crashing oil prices. (AFP)

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/saudi-relaxes-virus-lockdown-except-in-hotspots-mecca.html

Hope they will give them enough food...

Operatives of the Nigerian Police Force have arrested a deadly criminal gang responsible for the kidnap and murder of a Catholic Seminarian, Nnadi Michael of the Catholic Good Shepherd Major Seminary at Gonin Gora, Kaduna State. On January 9, this year, the criminal gang stormed the Catholic Seminary and kidnapped four seminarians, murdered one of them in cold blood and released the remaining three on 31st January after they had collected their ransom.

In a statement signed by Force Public Relations Officer, DCP Frank Mba, the suspects are Tukur Usman 37, who is a father of 7, Shehu Bello 40, who is a father of 5 and Mustapha Mohammed 30, a father of 1, all of Igabi LGA of Kaduna State. He said they were arrested after several months of intensive and extensive intelligence-led operations by crack detectives of the Intelligence Response Team (IRT).

According to Mba, discreet investigations so far reveal that the arrested suspects were part of a 19-man gang that also carried out the kidnap of Dr Phillip Ataga’s wife and two daughters on January 24, at Juji Community in Chikun, Kaduna State. He said investigation revealed that the same criminal gang was responsible for the kidnap of six students and two teachers of Engravers College, Chikun Kaduna State, in October 3, 2019.

He said the suspects belonged to a hybrid terrorist criminal network causing untold havoc in North-Central and have confessed to several other random operations along Abuja-Kaduna expressway where they kidnapped, killed and robbed motorists, collecting ransom and valuables running into millions of naira.

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/police-arrest-3-suspects-over-murder-of-mrs-ataga-catholic-seminarian.html

By Saturday, the latest figures for Covid-19 pandemic are up: 1,095 confirmed, 32 dead and 208 discharged. The last part is proving to be some contradiction for many people: how do you say 208 have recovered and been discharged from hospital for a disease that is said to have no cure? Coronavirus is a respiratory virus, and most viruses of this kind are self-limiting. It means they have a finite period in your body before they wear themselves out, or your immune system contains them. When that happens, you recover. For a person, that means your immune chews up the virus so it is no longer able to infect new cells.

For a community, that means the virus is unable to find new people to infect. Treatment in this case has two aims: one is to relieve symptoms and make you comfortable; two is to keep you alive by supporting the organs the virus has attacked [in this case, your lungs, which is why oxygen and ventilators are needed]. Isolation centre at Kebbi Medical Centre, Kalgo The treatment is not a cure. For one, self-limiting viral illnesses resolve on their own, like the cold and catarrh you have nearly every year. The cough medicines you only ease the chesty cough, and help you expel phlegm easier.

They don’t attack the virus behind the cold. Your immune system produces antibodies that do that, and once that mother of all battles is won, you bounce back. And your body becomes stronger for another battle should the virus return. And then again, because viruses mutate rapidly to fit into every new environment, it is difficult to spend years developing a medicine to target them. By the time you get the medicine, they may have mutated into a form that’s resistant to the wonder drug. Hence the best treatment is prevention—social distancing, hygiene and modifications to break the chain of transmission.

The other is vaccination to teach your immune system to recognise and fight the virus when it comes around again. At a facility in Osun, public health officials visiting to provide care ensure patients abide by social distancing, one way of limiting the spread of the coronavirus. Photo: NCDC. But if you do get infected, you can be treated in a way that’s called “supportive treatment”.

It is different from “definitive treatment”. Say you have typhoid fever. Your doctor gives you antibiotics that directly target and kill the Salmonella typhii bacteria responsible for the typhoid. Once the bacteria is eliminated, your body’s “mechanic’s garage” takes over, repairing the damage done and you recover. That’s definitive treatment. In supportive treatment, as is the case for Lassa fever, Ebola and Covid-19, treatment does not eliminate the virus but relieves the symptoms and support the organs already damaged while waiting for your immune system to contain the virus.

So, you get cough syrup to suppress cough, paracetamol to cool fevers, painkillers to suppress pain. Because coronavirus attacks the lungs, oxygenators help raise the oxygen levels in your blood and ventilators take over the breathing function of your lungs, while waiting for your immune system to return from the battlefield. When the immune system returns, having won the war by containing the virus, and you are still alive through supportive treatment, you have recovered. But if the damage done by the virus is too much and the supportive treatment is not able to keep you alive to see the end of the battle between your immune and the virus, then it is RIP.

This battle can last two to six weeks depending on, among other things, the health of your immune system, which is why that is your greatest arsenal against Covid-19. The other things include age, sex differences in immune response, gaps in immune system, race, the dose of the virus entering the body, the strain of the virus, the presence of pre-existing conditions (like diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, cancer) and many other unknowns. They all factor into why the disease is mild for some and deadly for others.

The severity is classed into different forms based on how the virus attacks the respiratory system. Asymptomatic—you get infected but show no symptoms and end up being a mere carrier spreading the infection to others. Mild—you get the virus but have just regular upper respiratory tract infection—sneezing, mild fever, cough—and recover with or without supportive treatment.

Moderate—you get lower respiratory tract infection, with pneumonia and need some supportive treatment but you may not be sick enough to need oxygen therapy. Severe—you get up to pneumonia and get so sick you need oxygen. Critical—it is so bad you develop acute respiratory distress syndrome; your lungs fail and you need a ventilator to mechanically breathe—and a full array of intensive care unit, without which you may not survive.

Yes, there is no cure, and yes, it is your immune system that clears the virus and relieves the symptoms. And yes, if all this care is provided, even without a definitive cure for coronavirus disease, you can still pull through to recovery.

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/no-cure-for-covid-19-but-heres-how-you-can-recover.html

hmmm

Chairmen of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 36 states and the FCT have refuted a media report claiming that they had recommended the party’s national leadership to be involved in the choice of a new Chief of Staff for President Muhammadu Buhari, following the death of Malam Abba Kyari.

The chairman, Forum of APC chairmen in Nigeria and APC chairman in Borno State, Ali Bukar Dalori, said in Maiduguri yesterday that the clarification became necessary the forum only intended to condole with the president over the death of Kyari and not be dragged into the issue of succession, which is completely outside its mandate. “Our message to the president was purely to convey our thoughts and prayers to him over the loss of his chief of staff and friend of over 40 years.

In reporting the condolence however, it was erroneously suggested that we recommended the APC national leadership to choose late Abba Kyari’s successor for the president. While it was totally outside our mandate to be involved on issue of the president’s chief of staff, associating us with such matter at a time the president and the country were at the peak of bereavement tended to present the forum of APC chairmen as being highly insensitive to the mood of the president, our party and the country.

In addition, we also know a vacant office of chief of staff is not one that the constitution mandates immediate replacement hence, there was never a basis for hurry,” Dalori said. He added that the forum was experienced enough to recognize that appointment of a chief of staff, being the closest and most senior personal aide, is normally the exclusive privilege of the president.

Source: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/apc-chairmen-didnt-recommend-selection-for-kyaris-successor-dalori.html

The World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Office for Africa says the number of COVID-19 deaths in the WHO African Region has increased to 1, 200. The UN’s health agency gave the update on its official twitter account @WHOAFRO on Friday. “Over 27, 000 COVID-19 cases reported on the African continent – with over 7, 000 associated recoveries and 1,200 deaths recorded,” it said. The WHO African Region COVID-19 dashboard showed that in sub-Saharan Africa, South Africa suffered the most severe outbreak, while Cameroon and Ghana had more than 2, 000 confirmed cases.

The figures on the dashboard showed that South Africa, Algeria and Cameroon had continued to top the list of countries with the highest reported cases. It showed that South Africa had 3, 953 cases and 75 deaths followed by Algeria with 3, 007 cases and 407 deaths, while Cameroon had 1,401 confirmed cases with 49 deaths. According to the dashboard, South Sudan, Sao Tome and Principe, Mauritania and The Gambia are countries with the lowest confirmed cases in the region.

It showed that South Sudan had the lowest confirmed cases of four reported with zero death. Mauritania, the dashboard showed, was second country with the lowest confirmed cases with seven reported cases and one death. Sao Tome and Principe, the third country with the lowest cases, had recorded eight confirmed cases with zero death. Also, the dashboard showed that Nigeria was number six among the countries with the highest cases with 981 confirmed cases and 31 deaths.

In a related development, the agency in “COVID-19 for WHO Africa Region External Situation Report 8” posted on its twitter handle said the COVID-19 pandemic had continued to spread in the WHO African Region. According to the report, COVID-19 cases in the WHO African Region have increased by 43 per cent in the past week and the number of deaths also increased by 38 per cent. It said the Pandemic had continued to spread despite the implementation of lockdown orders in the vast majority of countries.

“The number of new confirmed cases continues to increase every week, albeit at a slower pace than previously, thus indicating that the peak of the outbreak has not yet been reached. “Four countries (South Africa, Algeria, Cameroon and Ghana) have recorded over 1 000 cases; these countries alone account for over half (55 per cent) of the cases reported in the region. “It is essential to reinforce mitigation measures in these countries in order to reduce morbidity and mortality, maintain essential health services and minimise the disruption of public services and economic activities,” the report said.

At the same time, it said just over half (53 per cent) of affected countries had reported fewer than 100 cases to date. “In these countries, measures to contain or at least delay the spread of the outbreak need to be intensified. “The measures include active case finding, testing and isolation of cases, contact tracing, physical distancing and promotion of good personal hygiene practices.

“Also, the absence of reported COVID-19 cases from Comoros and Lesotho calls for a reinforcement of the alert management system in these countries, including the intensification of active case search and testing of suspected cases. “Governments need to commit local resources, supplemented by the donor communities, to support the implementation of their containment and mitigation strategies,” concludes the report. (NAN)

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/covid-19-deaths-rise-to-1-200-in-africa-who.html

Waterypussy2:
That means other leaders in ecowas are walking corpse

The Presidential Task Force (PTF) says 5,000 frontline health workers responding to the Novel Coronavirus (COVID19), pandemic outbreak in the country will receive Life Insurance Cover. Mr Boss Mustapha, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and PTF chairman on COVID-19, said this at the PTF daily briefing on COVID19 on Friday in Abuja. Mustapha said N112, 500, was fully paid by the Nigerian Insurance Industry in line with the principle of “No Premium No Cover” for the health workers.

The SGF said the Ministry of Health in conjunction with other Ministries, Departments and Agencies and Health professional bodies have also signed an MOU for various allowances and incentives for frontline health workers. He noted that the financial commitments were in line with Federal Government’s unending support for the Frontline workers. Meanwhile, he called on farmers to start preparing to return to their farms as the rainy season begins.

Also speaking, Dr Osagie Ehanire, Minister of Health said that starter packs had been deployed to all tertiary health institutions and Federal Medical Centres nationwide to ensure that frontline health workers were protected. Ehanire commended all health workers in the frontline of COVID-19 for their courage and patriotism. He, however, urged them to protect themselves and remain vigilant in the line of duty.

“Protect yourselves as prescribed. Use your personal protective equipment judiciously. Do not attempt to treat COVID-19 patients without wearing adequate PPE or if your institution is not accredited to do so. “This is important because we need to keep health workers safe at such a time and cannot afford an increase in number of those who test positive to COVID-19 and have to go into self-isolation.

“Remain vigilant in the line of duty and maintain high index of suspicion for this infection,” he said. He advised medical authorities across the country against dismissing any health worker. He stressed that all health workers were needed at this period when the nation was combating a pandemic and therefore, all hands must be on deck. “This is not the time for any doctor to be pulled out of service. We need everybody at this time.

We need the nurses, laboratory scientists, we need all hands on deck at this time,” he said. The minister who gave this advice while responding to questions concerning the dismissal of a certain group of doctors added that although he was not aware about the incident, saying it would be investigated. “With regards to the doctors who were dismissed, there must have been administration reasons which I don’t know about. I

t will be looked into by the board at the hospital,” he noted. He said that the high number of COVID-19 cases in the country was due to community transmission and increased testing. The minister said that Nigerians who require no treatment still need to be in isolation in the interest of the public.

He stated that the use of face masks was recommended when people are going out of their homes. “To defeat COVID-19 requires individual and collective efforts,” he said. (NAN)

Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/covid-19-5000-frontline-health-workers-to-receive-life-insurance-cover.html

presido...

g

Amen

hmmm

Do more..

Which kind prayer we will pray for this woman?

m

Good one

Be like this man is powerless, because he can not even cure one person of coronavirus.

Everybody should mind his/her business....Coro is real

May be

Hunt27:
So you think buhari is more active than Ghana president?

Mr Buhari is the most active person among the leaders

Hunt27:
You say?

I think among the ECOWAS leaders non is active like mr Buhari. My opinion anyway