The Oyo State COVID-19 Task Force says it is not overwhelmed with the recent surge in the third wave of COVID-19 Delta variant cases.
Dr Olabode Ladipo, the state Incident Manager and Coordinator of the Emergency Operations Centre, made the clarifications on Tuesday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Ibadan.
Ladipo told NAN that “the message, which bears all the hallmarks of a normal WhatsApp rumour, was a forwarded text from an unknown source”.
He, however, said though, there was a spike in COVID-19 cases, the state isolation centres still have free bed spaces as of the time of filling this report.
“As of this moment, we are managing the situation pretty well.
“The isolation centre/infectious disease centre at Olodo has free bed spaces, same as the Isolation Centres at Agbami and Oyo.
“Recently, the old Jericho Nursing Home was renovated and we currently have 21 free beds ready for our patients.
“So, it’s not a situation in which I would say we are overwhelmed,” Ladipo told NAN.
According to him, the spike in COVID-19 cases, as being witnessed in the state, is not peculiar to the state, but a national issue.
He attributed the soaring cases to the recently concluded festivities, as well as travellers coming in from outside the country.
“It is a national issue, as people are travelling and a lot of movements were recorded recently due to the public holidays.
“That was why before the Eid-el-Kabir festival, we had a media parley to increase public sensitisation, because we envisaged what could happen, if people didn’t take caution,” Ladipo said.
Commenting on the numbers of COVID-19 related deaths, the incident manager said that the state recorded four deaths on Monday.
He also denied claims that the spike in COVID-19 cases was due to the virulent Delta strain of the Coronavirus.
“We use the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test to detect the Coronavirus; for the PCR, it doesn’t state which particular strain of the virus we are dealing with.
“We will have to sequence and go through another process to determine which strain and it takes over a week; it’s cost intensive.
“We only try to determine a particular strain when a case is highly suspicious. It is not like we are testing for variants in every single case,” he said.
NAN reports that the circulated message on different WhatsApp platforms states: “Attention! Attention! COVID-19 case is rising rapidly in Oyo State. Olodo Isolation Center is filled up (68) patients.
“Agbami Isolation Center has been re-opened today with a five patients in now. Let us all be careful please.”(NAN)
