Daily COVID Tracker: BUA/CACOVID face-off and global cases decline

The global fight against the COVID-19 pandemic has recorded some progress. The number of new cases has declined by 17 percent. Here are some updates on the pandemic this Wednesday.  

Ondo rejects NCDC COVID-19 figure for state

The Ondo state government has faulted the figure released by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on the COVID-19 situation in the state.

In a statement on Tuesday, Jibayo Adeyeye, acting commissioner for health, said the figure recently declared is a cumulative of several days and does not mean that the state is severely affected.

“The NCDC report created an impression that the state was now the most severely affected in the country. This is far from the state,” he said.

“The true picture is that the figure recently declared for the state is cumulative of arrears for several days due to delay in getting results from the testing laboratories.

“Though the government is concerned about the rate of infection in the state, the data indicates that the state is clearly not the most affected in the country.”

Global COVID-19 cases decline by 17 percent

Relative progress has been made worldwide in tackling the pandemic.

The number of new cases of COVID-19 reported across the globe declined for the fourth week in a row.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) in its weekly epidemiological update said over 3.1 million new cases of COVID-19 were reported last week, indicating a 17 percent decline from the previous week — the lowest number of cases reported since the last week of October.

The United States accounts for the highest number of new COVID-19 cases — with 871,365. But this figure has witnessed a 19 percent decline from the previous week.

According to WHO, Brazil, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom are among the countries reporting the highest number of new cases worldwide.

According to Worldometers, global statistics platform, the world has confirmed 107.4 million COVID-19 cases, out of which 79.3 million recoveries have been recorded, with 2.3 million deaths.

BUA/CACOVID face-off

There was a back and forth, accusation and counter-accusation between BUA Group and the Private Sector Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID) on Tuesday regarding the donation of one million AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines to Nigeria.

BUA, a member of  CACOVID, had said it secured the vaccines through AfreximBank by “paying the full amount”.

CACOVID, however, countered BUA’s claim of securing the vaccines by itself.

The coalition said the purchase of the vaccine cannot be done by individuals or companies, but only through the federal government.

But BUA fired back, asking CACOVID to stop playing politics with Nigerian lives.

Reaffirming its position that BUA did not singlehandedly pay for the vaccines, Zouera Youssofou, CACOVID coordinator, said while payment was indeed made for the vaccines, it cannot be attributed to a single person or company.

France extends state of health emergency until June

France has vowed to drastically curtail the spread of COVID-19 in the country.

French lawmakers on Tuesday approved a bill to extend the country’s state of health emergency until June 1 — as the country’s death toll surpasses 80,000.

The current state of emergency was due to expire on February 16.

The law authorises the government to implement restrictions and impose a lockdown to limit the spread of COVID-19 nationwide.

Olivier Véran, health minister, said the country could avoid a third lockdown, despite the warnings of the scientific community.

“It is, of course, possible that we will never go into lockdown again. It is desirable,” Véran said.

“Lockdown is not a choice of ease, of safety. Lockdown is a choice of necessity when the epidemic situation is beyond our control. Today this is not the case.”

COVID-19 IN NIGERIA