Going by the statistics released by the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC ), COVID-19, especially the delta variant is back with a vengeance as Nigeria recorded a total of 790 new infections on Wednesday, the highest in over six months.
This brings the total number of confirmed cases in Nigeria to 179,908.
The NCDC said via its verified website on Thursday morning that the figure of 790 is sharp jump from the from the 610 cases it registered a day earlier.
The health agency also said that one new death was recorded on Wednesday, bringing the nation’s fatality count to 2,195.
A total of 74 people recovered and were discharged from various isolation centres in the country on Wednesday, with total recoveries nationwide since the onset of the pandemic clocking 166,203, the NCDC added.
The agency said that the country had tested 2,589,130 samples for the virus out its roughly 210 million population, with an average test positivity rate of six percent.
It also disclosed that the country’s active cases had soared to 11,500.
The surge resulted in the federal government calling on citizens to take responsibility and adhere to preventive measures in the country, especially as the caseload keeps rising on the heels of an ongoing doctors strike.
The NCDC noted that States nationwide were struggling to curb the spread of the Delta variant, with the situation becoming alarming particularly in Lagos, Akwa-Ibom, Rivers , Oyo States and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), where the strain was accounting for a large number of the cases.
According to NCDC statistics, Lagos State set a new record for COVID-19 on Wednesday with 574 cases while infections in Rivers State jumped to 83, Ondo-38, Ogun-31, Oyo-23, Delta-10, the FCT-9, Ekiti-7, Edo-6, Osun-4.
Anambra and Bayelsa recorded 2 cases each and Plateau-1.
The agency reported that vaccination was also providing better protection than natural immunity for adults previously infected with COVID-19 from getting re-infected.
It warned that scientists believed the Delta variant to be as contagious as chickenpox, as one infected person carries the potential of infecting eight or nine more, just as the strain had shown its efficacy in infecting younger people as against the older strains of the virus.
