As the second wave of the COVID-19 continues to spread in Nigeria, more deaths from the disease are being recorded.
Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) in its record on Friday announced one of its highest coronavirus-related deaths – 12 new casualties.
The latest figure – an increase of about 50 per cent from the six fatalities recorded the previous day – has taken the death toll to 1342 in total.
In the past 21 days, there have been 130 fatalities as a result of COVID-19 complications in Nigeria.
The government has blamed the increasing deaths on later referral of COVID-19 patients to treatment centres.
The spike in new infections is also showing no signs of slowing as Nigeria recorded yet another relatively high daily figure of 1,544 reported from 21 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on Friday.
Lagos led with 739 new cases on Friday – nearly half of the daily total. The commercial city is Nigeria’s coronavirus epicenter with a total of nearly 35,000 confirmed cases and about 252 deaths.
1544 new cases of #COVID19Nigeria;
Lagos-739
Plateau-168
FCT-153
Oyo-91
Nasarawa-90
Rivers-80
Kaduna-35
Edo-33
Kano-29
Ogun-21
Delta-19
Sokoto-16
Akwa Ibom-11
Ebonyi-11
Enugu-10
Osun-10
Niger-9
Bauchi-8
Kebbi-8
Katrina-2
Taraba-197,478 confirmed
78,552 discharged
1,342 deaths pic.twitter.com/gKOwQpoLJY— NCDC (@NCDCgov) January 8, 2021
The figure, one of the highest so far since the virus began spreading in the country, indicated a slight decrease from the 1,565 reported on Thursday.
This week, Nigeria has been smashing previous records of highest daily tallies to indicate how swift the officially declared second wave of COVID-19 is spreading.
On Monday, Nigeria recorded 1,204 new cases as the country’s highest daily figure, a record smashed by the 1,354 infections reported from 21 states on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, the country recorded yet another highest daily tally ever with 1,664 cases.
The 1,544 new cases on Friday pushed the total number of infections since the start of the pandemic in the country to 97,478.
Health officials are advising stricter adherence to safety measures as the only way to reduce further spread.
In Africa, Nigeria is the 9th most affected country by the coronavirus after South Africa, Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia, Ethiopia, Libya, Kenya and Algeria.
The federal government recently warned that a significant increase in coronavirus infections in Nigeria appears imminent this January due to continued violation of safety protocols during the Christmas period.
Active cases in the country rose sharply from about 3,000 about a month ago to over 17,000 due to a rise in new infections.
Of the over 97,000 cases so far, 78,552 patients have been discharged from hospitals after treatment.
Our discharges today include 264 community recoveries in Lagos State and 147 community recoveries in Plateau State managed in line with guidelines.
A breakdown of cases by state can be found via https://t.co/zQrpNeOfet pic.twitter.com/l5SWB2aE61
— NCDC (@NCDCgov) January 8, 2021
With the country in the second wave of the pandemic, federal authorities have ordered the reopening of all isolation and treatment centres in the country.
Federal government has also reintroduced new restrictions to check the spread of the virus, including closure of bars and nightclubs and limiting the number of people allowed in a public gathering.
So far, Nigeria has conducted over a million COVID-19 tests.
