Chikwe Iheakwazu, director-general of the Nigeria Centre for
Disease Control (NCDC), said the mutant strain of the coronavirus (COVID-19) in
the UK has not been found in Nigeria.
Iheakwazu was speaking on Thursday in Abuja during the
presidential taskforce (PTF) briefing on COVID-19.
He said that the NCDC, in collaboration with the Africa
Centre of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases (ACEGID), has done
some sequencing in the past and did not find the UK variant which he described
as deadlier than the original strain.
“Over the last few days, we have monitored reports of the
virus mutating in the UK, South Africa and some other countries, but it is
important to establish some facts about what we know, what we do not know and
what we are willing to learn over the next few years,” Iheakwazu said.
“We haven’t found the UK strain but it is not something we
have been looking for…To find that you have to do sequencing and our focus has
not been on sequencing. We did some sequencing in the past but we haven’t found
that.
“However, we are doing more sequencing now. Is it possible
that they are circulating? Yes. This is because there are a lot of travels
between the UK and Nigeria.”
Iheakwazu said NCDC would collaborate with other
stakeholders to collect new samples for sequencing in order to determine their
variant.
“This is ongoing work. It cannot happen in a hurry. It is
very complex. Sequencing is not a straight forward business which is why we
have only a few centres that are able to do it,” he said.
The NCDC boss also urged states to reopen their testing
centres, saying the NCDC alone could not conduct all COVID-19 tests received
from states.
According to him, the NCDC centre is working on adopting the
use of rapid diagnostic test kits as from 2021 to scale-up testing.
He said: “On testing, there is light at the end of the
tunnel… We have made a significant procurement that is coming in in January and
through that, we are taking testing closer to the people and away from the
laboratories.”
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