The Lagos State commissioner of health, Professor Akin Abayomi has visited the corona virus patient, an Italian natinal who was confirmed as first patient in Nigeria at the Infectious Diseases Hospital in Yaba.
During the visit, Abayomi assured the patient that the Lagos State Government will ensure that he gets adequate care.
The Infectious Diseases Hospital was established at the Mainland Hospital in 2012 by the Lagos State Government with funding support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and technical assistance from Family Health International (FHI 360) under the TBCARE project. The facility was initially an ultra-modern multi-drug resistance tuberculosis (MDR-TB) treatment centre.
During the Ebola Disease Crisis in Nigeria, the government decided MDR-TB treatment centre was a suitable place for the containment and treatment of Ebola Disease.
Since then, the facility has been upgraded by the Lagos State Government, the Canadian Government, the British Government, the US Government and various international agencies to enable it deal with various infectious diseases. It is one of the centres that is designated for the treatment of Lassa Fever and it is at this hospital that the Italian Corona Virus patient is being kept.
Until recently there were only two diagnostic laboratories in Sub-Saharan Africa that were capable of diagnosing diseases like the Corona Virus and Ebola. One is in South Africa and the other is in Senegal. During the Ebola crisis, test samples were flown from Nigeria to the Pastur Institute in Senegal. Now there are three such laboratories in Nigeria, one in Lagos, one in Abuja and one in Benin.
Update, the Infectious Diseases Hospital is now capable of running tests for the Corona Virus.
