Nigeria records 288 new infections but recovery rate rises significantly

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) confirmed 288 new cases on Friday, but the recovery rate rose siginficantly.

The agency announced the new cases via a tweet on its handle just before midnight.

A total of 5,445 confirmed COVID-19 cases have now been recorded in 34 states and the federal capital territory (FCT).

The number of recoveries increased from 1,180 to 1,320, while four fatalities were recorded, bringing the total number of deaths to 171.

Nigeria recorded its highest number of COVID-19 recoveries in one week on Friday, with 140 patients discharged.

Also, after almost one week of recording a steady drop in its figures, from 183 COVID-19 cases on May 7 to as low as 58 cases on May 14, the infection rate in Lagos saw a significant spike on Friday.

288 new cases of #COVID19;

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179-Lagos
20-Kaduna
15-Katsina
15-Jigawa
13-Borno
11-Ogun
8-Kano
7-FCT
4-Niger
4-Ekiti
3-Oyo
3-Delta
3-Bauchi
2-Kwara
1-Edo

5445 cases of #COVID19 in Nigeria
Discharged: 1320
Deaths: 171 pic.twitter.com/WOllJ4pGlc

— NCDC (@NCDCgov) May 15, 2020

In his response to a question at the presidential task force on COVID-19 briefing on Friday, Chikwe Ihekweazu, the NCDC director-general, had acknowledged the gradual drop in the number of cases over a few days, but said the period under review wasn’t enough to assume that the curve was flattening.

“It’s never good to interpret rises or drops in days. So, when you see one, two days of an increase or a decrease, you’ll never see me come out and say cases have increased or decreased,” he said.

“We look at trends over time and we’ll continue to monitor this over time and if we do see a consistent decrease, then we’ll be happy. But it’s way too early to interpret results on a day-to-day basis. We’ll rather take it on a week-to-week or two-week basis.”