The Cheer News
Breaking News

NCDC Gives New Guideline For Discharging COVID-19 Patients

BY LEVI JOHNSON

The Director-General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu has given a new guideline for the discharge of COVID-19 treated patients in their custody.

He said NCDC has reduced the number of tests conducted on persons infected with coronavirus (COVID-19) before they are certified to have recovered from the disease.

Ihekweazu, stated this during his interview on Thursday at the Channels Television.

He reiterated that recovered COVID-19 patients are now discharged from the isolation centres after their first negative test.

According to him, the discharge criterion at the moment is a single negative test in Nigeria.

“We used to do two negative tests – 48 hours apart – but because of challenges of bed space capacity, we reduced that to a single negative test then discharge the patient to another one week of home isolation … that’s the policy at the moment,” he explained.

Dr Ihekweazu reacted to the allegations that the NCDC has refused to release some patients from its isolation facility after they recovered from the disease.

He also faulted the claims that he directed that COVID-19 patients should not be taken to isolation centres if they do not show symptoms of the disease.

READ ALSO: Power Minister Must Resign Over Incompetence – Electricity Workers

According to the NCDC boss, the agency does not manage any patient but support clinicians in various states with guidelines.

He stressed that the decisions on the management of COVID-19 cases were left for the state authorities to take.

On how long infected patients stay at isolation centres, Dr Ihekweazu said, “The average duration of hospitalisation that we have found has been 10 to 11 days, although some have said that they have been discharged on the fourth day (a few people).

“There are also extremes that have stayed over 30 days; I think the longest that has been discharged in our record right now is about 38 days.”

“We have patients that have stayed longer than that and that number will change once they are discharged. The average duration of hospitalisation is 11 days to be precise,” he added.

Related posts

Econet Group Launches Cassava Technologies To Propel Africa Into Economic Future

EDITOR

Video: Unity Of Religion Agreement, Sign Of End Time

EDITOR

African Union Member States reporting COVID-19 cases

EDITOR

Leave a Comment