DesChyko:


For a start, he copied the content without credit to the original creator. I just reported him to the owner of this post. He should expect action for copyright infringement. This post isn't even up to a week it was created.

Exc2000:


No, you write RantHQ together without space, and its a closed group that you have to request to join

adelaja70:

IBOS CAN MAKE NOISE.... THOSE ARE FAKE RANTS. I'M A SOLID MEMBER

Scaredd:


Yes! That's the group. A wise person doesn't mix tribalism and business. Now she'll understand what she has done to herself.

As the phased easing of lockdown begins in Lagos State on Monday, May 4, the state government says it will not spare any erring motorist, be it private owners or commercial operators, who fails to adhere to its new transportation guidelines.

Announcing via Twitter on Sunday, the government said a special task force has been formed to enforce the new guidelines which include that all commuters wear face masks, maintain social distancing in sitting arrangement and move only between 6am and 7pm every day.

The notice read, “Enforcement of the new transportation guidelines commences on Monday, 4th of May, 2020. Motorists are hereby advised to obey the guidelines to avoid an encounter with the Special Task Force comprising the Police, Lagos State Traffic Management Authority, Vehicle Inspection Service, as well as Abandoned Vehicles and Parks Monitoring Committees.

“Yellow buses, popularly called ‘Danfo’, must not carry more than eight passengers (two on a row), tricycles are to carry just two passengers at the back, while private car owners must also observe social distancing.

“All commercial and commuter operations within Lagos shall be between the hours of 6am and 7pm daily. It is mandatory for all commuters to wear nose covers, wash their hands with soap under running water and, therefore, use alcohol-based sanitisers before and after each trip.”

According to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control on Saturday night, of the total 2388 coronavirus infections reported in the country, 1068 cases were recorded in Lagos with about 30 attendant fatalities and 247 recoveries, the highest by any state in Nigeria.

The PUNCH reports that Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu recently launched the #MaskUpLagos campaign to sensitise the about 20 million population of people within the state on the need to wear face masks while in public places, observe social distancing and practice good hygiene as part of collective efforts to curb the spread of the lethal virus.

The Nigerian Union of Allied Health Professionals on Sunday called on the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd), to reverse his decision on the easing of COVID-19 lockdown, which takes effect today (Monday).

The NUAHP made the call in a statement signed by its National President, Dr Obinna Ogbonna, and its General Secretary, Martin Egbanubi.

As health workers advised the President, members of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 he sent to Kano State expressed concern about the high rate of community transmission in the state.

The presidential team said 80 per cent of every 100 samples taken from the state for testing always came out positive.

As of March, the state had no case of COVID-19, but on April 11, a former ambassador, who attended a Jumat service while awaiting his coronavius test result, was diagnosed with the virus.

As of 5.51pm on Sunday, there were 313 COVID-19 cases in the state, which was second to Lagos State that had 1,084, the highest in the country.

Buhari had, in his broadcast to the nation on April, 27, imposed a total lockdown on Kano State and dispatched a team of experts to the state the following day as part of efforts to stop the spread of the virus.

But in the national broadcast on April 27, he said there would be phased and gradual easing of the lockdown in the Federal Capital Territory, Ogun and Lagos states, which started on March 30.

He, however, imposed a dusk to dawn curfew on the country and banned inter-state movements.

Kano has high rate of community transmission –Head of FG’s team

The Head of the team sent to Kano State by the President, Dr Nasiru Gwarzo, said the state had a high rate of community transmission of COVID-19.

Gwarzo told the BBC Hausa service in an interview that the high rate of transmission, as shown by increased testing, was evident when compared to the former situation in the state.

According to him, there is an urgent need for the people of Kano to take the deadly disease seriously as out of every 100 samples samples taken for testing, 80 per cent always came out positive.

He said, “This is a serious situation which needs collective effort to address as the case of pandemic has gone beyond people’s imagination as it has gone to community transmission.

“What we are afraid of in this pandemic is what is happening. The pandemic has left the first stage of entering the country. It has left the second stage and has entered the third stage of community spread. This is not news that will be palatable to the public but like a Hausa proverb says, ‘on the day you are to take a bath, you cannot hide your navel.’”

Most of the strange deaths in Kano caused by COVID-19, says Gwarzo

He said the team was worried about deaths, which had claimed many personalities in the state.

According to him, most of the recent mass deaths in the state were caused to COVID-19.

He said, “If you follow the debate (over the cause of the Kano mysterious deaths), while there is some truth in other causes, (complications from hypertension, meningitis, among others), coronavirus is the leading cause of these deaths in Kano.”

…says normalcy won’t return until 2021, cases hit 2,388

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control has expressed fears that the number of coronavirus cases in the country will continue to rise for the next few months. This hint came as the lockdown imposed on the Federal Capital Territory, Lagos and Ogun states ends at 11:59pm today.

The Director General, NCDC, Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, told Sunday PUNCH in an interview that the number of cases was likely to increase given the increasing capacity to find and test more cases.

There were 220 new cases on Saturday as the total rose to 2, 388. The number of discharged persons rose to 385 while the number of deaths increased to 85.

The new cases were 62 in Lagos; 52 in FCT; 31 in Kaduna; 13 in Sokoto; 10 in Kebbi; 9 in Yobe; 6 in Borno; 5 in each of Edo and Bauchi; 4 in each of Gombe, Enugu, Oyo; 3 in Zamfara and 2 in each of Nasarawa, Osun, Ebonyi, Kwara, Kano and Plateau states.

Earlier, as part of measures to contain the rising spread of the virus in the country, the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), on March 30 imposed a 14-day lockdown on the FCT, Lagos and Ogun states, followed by a two-week extension. He noted that the extension became necessary as the pandemic was no longer a joke and had become a matter of life and death.

At the expiration of the extension on April 27, the President, in a nationwide broadcast on Monday, again extended the lockdown by one week, which terminates today. The President, however, said a nationwide curfew between 8pm and 6am would follow as a further measure to contain the spread of the virus.

Many state governors also introduced similar restrictions in their states, even though some have begun easing the lockdown despite the rising number of cases across the country.

Asked about his projection on when Nigeria would likely reach its peak and how prepared the nation was for it, the NCDC DG said, “There are various projections that have been developed based on various contexts. With the increasing capacity to find and test more cases, we will continue to see an increase in cases in the next few months.

“Our strategy is to test quickly, detect confirmed cases, isolate and manage cases to recovery and follow up with contacts to reduce the risk of spread.

“In the absence of a vaccine for this disease, we must continue to adhere strictly to directives from the Federal Government on non-pharmaceutical interventions such as closure of large gatherings and physical distancing. By doing these, we have a better chance of reducing the risk of spread of this disease quickly.”

When reminded that despite setting up 15 COVID-19 testing laboratories, less than 20,000 tests had been carried out so far, Ihekweazu said people could access the situation report on the NCDC website. “On the 1st of May alone, we recorded over 2,000 cases and this will continue to increase,” he added.

He added that in preparing for the increase in cases, the NCDC was working closely with state governments to rapidly scale up the capacity in treatment centres, even as he had hinted previously that the virus would eventually spread to all the states.

Notably, there has been an astronomical increase in the number of cases in the past few days. Since February 27 when Nigeria recorded its first case, the nation didn’t hit the 1,000 mark until about two months after, April 24 specifically when the number of cases rose from 981 to 1,095. The number of deaths then was 32.

But, barely one week after hitting the 1,000 mark, the number of cases reached the 2,000 mark on May 1, when the cases rose by 238 to hit 2,170. The number of deaths also more than doubled as the casualty figure rose to 85 within the period.

The Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Prof Akin Abayomi, had recently warned that the state, which is the epicentre of the deadly virus, had yet to reach its COVID-19 peak. He had also warned on March 27 that the state might see up to 39,000 cases but that if everyone practised good social distancing, the figure would be limited to about 13,000.

Prior to the President’s latest broadcast on Monday, the Nigerian Medical Association warned that lifting or easing the lockdown was premature, given the “exponential” rise in the number of cases on a daily basis. It also warned that with the rate at which the virus was spreading, the consequence of lifting the lockdown could be tragic.

The World Health Organisation has also warned repeatedly that it would be hasty for countries to start lifting lockdowns. “No country is safe from potentially overwhelming outbreaks as long as the coronavirus is circulating,” it added.

Despite the warnings not to lift the lockdown, the Federal Government however said it had put in place measures to contain the transmission of the disease.

The Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 announced on Wednesday during its media briefing that the use of face masks had become mandatory, noting that despite the directive that government offices and banks could resume operations from Monday, maintaining physical distancing and personal hygiene remained necessary.

“The restrictions on social and religious gatherings shall remain in place; state governments, corporate organisations and philanthropists are encouraged to support the production of cloth masks for citizens,” it added.

The National Coordinator of the task force, Dr Aliyu Sani, noted that to reduce the congestion, banks could only open between 8am and 2pm while civil servants on specific grade levels would be allowed to resume in their offices at specific times.

He stressed that all staff and bank customers must adhere to the personal hygiene and social distancing safety protocols, adding that all movements would be prohibited during the period except for essential services. He added that the ban on non-essential inter-state passenger travel remained until further notice.

But in a statement on Friday night, the NMA President, Dr Francis Faduyile, stressed that the timing for lifting the lockdown was premature because the nation was still battling with inadequate Personal Protective Equipment for health workers, lack of enough bed spaces in states for infected people and rising infections across the country, amongst others.

He added, “The easing of the lockdown even in phases is very premature. Nigeria should learn from her neighbour, Ghana, where the same action produced 100 per cent increase in infection rate in just a week.”

We won’t return to normalcy until 2021, says NCDC DG

Meanwhile, the NCDC DG has said the country, like the rest of the world, will not return to life as it was before the coronavirus pandemic until 2021.

Ihekweazu, who spoke on Saturday on The Platform, an annual event of Covenant Christian Centre, explained that though mass gatherings could be difficult to avoid, it would be for the best.

According to him, it is a sacrifice “we will have to make as a people to get over this.”

He highlighted that members of the public would have to rethink how they conducted businesses, social gatherings such as weddings and religious gatherings in the short term.

The NCDC boss said, “We are faced with a difficult reality and we are not unique in this. Every country is, right now, looking at the same challenge and how to get us back to some level of normalcy.

“But the reality is that we are going to live with COVID-19 for the next year, at the very least. So, we have to start thinking about how to live safely with COVID-19.

“Some of the changes we will need to make are actually good things to have forever. With the emphasis on hand washing, (use of) sanitisers and respiratory hygiene, my goal as the leader of the NCDC is that we continue doing this forever.”

He added that the habits would also prevent the spread of COVID-19, but also many other diseases.

“I hope we don’t go back, like we did post-Ebola, to an era of not washing our hands. Who would want that? So, we really want some of these measures to go on,” Ihekweazu said.

While fielding a question on the daily fight against COVID-19, the infectious diseases expert hinted that the worst had yet to come. “We really are at the beginning of this outbreak globally,” he said.

Ihekweazu added, “The point where we will assess how many people died in Nigeria versus everywhere else — it may be a year or two when we look back to the evolution of this outbreak. You can see that the outbreak comes in waves. We are not sure where we are on our own trajectory at the moment. It’s early days to reach conclusions around mortality.”

The NCDC DG noted that his team and many others across the country were working hard, adding that the state government and their care facilities were providing care for all those infected.

South Africa began to gradually ease its strict coronavirus lockdown on Friday, allowing some industries to reopen after five weeks of restrictions that plunged its struggling economy deeper into turmoil.

Africa’s most industrialised nation was already teetering with low growth and high debts when the lockdown kicked in on March 27.

On Wednesday S&P downgraded the country’s credit rating further to junk.

“The poor and the working class are having to bear the burden of a global pandemic that has caused severe economic and social disruption,” President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a televised May Day speech, adding that pre-existing challenges had been “exacerbated by the pandemic”.

“As we begin the process of easing the lockdown and many people start returning to work, we must remain vigilant and careful,” Ramaphosa cautioned.

“The road ahead will be long and hard, and we will make mistakes.”

With 5,647 confirmed cases and 103 fatalities, South Africa has the continent’s highest COVID-19 death toll.

But a mid-April government survey published on Friday showed that respondents were more concerned about a potential economic collapse than contracting coronavirus.

Many also feared the outbreak would trigger civil disorder in a country marred by social inequality and sporadic outbursts of xenophobic violence.

– ‘Very difficult battle’ –
“Our president … has got a very difficult battle with managing livelihoods and economic issues together with health issues,” Paul Kapelus, a development specialist cycling at a Johannesburg park, said in the early hours of the first day of the eased restrictions.


Around 1.5 million workers in selected industries will return to work in the next phase under strict health conditions, according to Trade and Industry Minister Ebrahim Patel.

Winter clothing, textile and packaging manufacturing were among the industries permitted to reopen factories from Friday.

Restaurants also opened only for takeaway deliveries but controversial bans on the sale of cigarettes and alcohol remained.

Social distancing and wearing masks in public and at workplaces will be mandatory.

Lipscomb:
What funny here now.

Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has said the delayed closure of the country’s borders, seaport, and airports, including the failure of returnees to self-isolate, caused the spread of COVID-19.

He said this during an Instalive interview with CNN on Wednesday.

According to the governor, Lagos was prepared to curb the spread of COVID-19 but had to wait for the Federal Government to shut airport, seaport and land borders.

The PUNCH reports that though Nigeria recorded its first COVID-19 death on February 27, the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), officially shut the country’s airports, seaports, and borders on March 29.

As of March 29 when president shut the country’s airports, seaports, and borders, Nigeria had recorded 111 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and one death.

When asked about the state’s preparedness, Sanwo-Olu said, “Given the population that we have, we are a bit ahead in terms of preparation, as a state, but we are sub-national. We couldn’t give directives as to when Nigeria should close the airport, seaport, or in-land border.

“We don’t have control over that. We were just wrapping up our own facilities and the training officials, and that was why we were able to track the index case over two months now.

“In the country, 33 or 34 states have had one case or the other. For us, it is a double X thing. The population is huge, so we will be a fool of ourselves to just think that it is going to be a spike and we will be out of it. Because we did not close all of the importations early and people were not also doing full isolation when they came, it was really difficult for us to do contact tracing before it got to the community – which is where we are now.”

The governor also reiterated that Lagos may be recording large cases “soon”, adding that over 7000 samples had been tested in the state.


He said, “We are pretty much getting to the peak season. We will soon see a large number because testing is now wrapped up. It is a public health issue and we needed to take our protocols from NCDC and other international organisations.

“Testing kits were rationalised and we could not do more than we were given. Even the accreditation requires processes. We have learnt it now and we are applying it.”

Meanwhile, state’s Commissioner for Health, Prof. Akin Abayomi, said Lagos has recorded 947 confirmed COVID-19 cases.

He said, “87 new #COVID-19 cases were confirmed in Lagos on April 29, 2020. The total number of confirmed cases in Lagos is now 947.

“The good news is that 49 additional #COVID-19 survivors have been discharged following their full recovery. The total number of discharged patients in Lagos now stands at 187.

“We regret to announce additional #COVID19 related death involving a 25-year-old male who at the time of admission was in a state of severe breathlessness. The total number of COVID-19 related deaths in Lagos is now 20.

“I again urge Lagos residents to remain committed to observing necessary precautionary measures to stop COVID-19 infection. Let’s be vigilant and report any concern about COVID-19 infection in our communities.”

However, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control on Wednesday announced that Lagos had recorded 21 fatalities from COVID-19.

Zamfara State Government has warned its Osun counterpart against deporting Northern youths who allegedly sneaked into the South-West state.

Zamfara made its position known in a statement by the Special Adviser to the Governor on Public Enlightenment, Media and Communications, Zailani Bappa, on Thursday.

The PUNCH had on Wednesday reported that Osun raised the alarm over the large influx of northern youths, especially Zamfara indigenes, into the state.

The Deputy Chief of Staff to the Governor of Osun State, Prince Adeyanju Biniyo, accused the northerners of “sneaking” into the state, threatening that the Osun Amotekun Corps has been notified to arrest and deport the “strangers”.

Reacting, Bappa faulted Binuyo, claiming that the Zamfara’s youths are Nigeria citizens who can reside in any state.

The statement read in part, “The attention of Zamfara State Government was drawn to a story credited to the Deputy Chief of Staff to the Governor of Osun State, Prince Adeyanju Abdullahi Biniyo, where he alleged “an influx of Zamfara indigenes” into the state and described it as “dangerous”.

“As if the entrants brought in war, he also called on the Osun indigenes ‘not to panic’ as the state has instructed Amotekun to fish them out and ensure that anyone escorting trucks that offload goods is turned back and escorted out of the state.

Doubtlessly, the above position as portrayed by the Deputy Chief of Staff is not statesmanly and smacks of bad taste. Indeed, it is condescending and totally negates good practices expected of leaders in a Federal setting such as Nigeria.

“It is, therefore, against federal law to instruct Amotekun to arrest “all Northern Youth who had escaped into the state by hiding in trucks” as quoted by Mr Binuyo for deportation back to their so-called state of origin.

“Nigeria and the World at large is facing a serious and challenging pandemic. All civilised societies are joining hands together to fight the spread of this pandemic and even extending helping hands to others. It is, therefore, disheartening that Osun state will take the path of isolating assumed outsiders and segregating what should be a common fight by all Nigerians.”