In a bid to contain the already escalating Ebola Virus in Lagos, Nigeria, the Lagos State Government through the Lagos state commissioner of Health, Dr Jide Idris has called on all striking doctors to return to work that all their demands are being met by the state government. The Lagos state which is presently experiencing shortage of doctors and health workers and has also come forward ask for Volunteer members to help contain the disease in Lagos.
In a news briefing yesterday, 6th August,Dr.Idris Indicated that the State government is willing to do anything to ensure that all Volunteers are catered for including a Life Insurance Policy. Dr. Idris also said they need help to find the other secondary contacts the Ebola victims must have made. They doctor said they have found 27contacts and that there are more of them.
Read Dr. Idris statement below;
“We will provide a life insurance for any doctor, nurse and other experts that want to work with isolated patients. We need more hands, because we have moved from the stage of primary contacts to secondary contacts.
“We are tracing all the people that had contact, not just with (the late) Sawyer, but those that had contacts with the health workers and others that have died.
“We have identified 27 secondary contacts already, we tracing the addresses of others.
“It is a tedious task, because we will also be taking their blood samples for testing and we will be monitoring them.
“We are appealing to the doctors on strike to resume work and set aside their grievances. No doubt, this situation is a dire emergency and our health professionals must recognise that.
“It will be morally unjustifiable for us to call for help from the international community if our own experts and doctors are not working.
“The bottom line is that we cannot provide the requisite expertise needed to manage these confirmed and probable cases”.
Idris said government would also be evacuating tuberculosis patients at the Infectious Diseases Hospital in Yaba, Lagos, to another hospital to accommodate more suspected and isolated cases of Ebola Virus Disease.
The commissioner said, “The TB patients at Mainland Hospital were protesting this morning but we appealed to them, that if they stay there they might be exposed and get infected.
“If we need to evacuate any hospital to ensure that we contain this disease, we will do it. If we have to take suspected cases to LASUTH, we will do it. If we need to take decisions that will be inconvenient for some people but beneficial to the larger population, we will do it. Ebola is a highly infectious disease. We will do it to contain it”.
“We are tracing all the people that had contact, not just with (the late) Sawyer, but those that had contacts with the health workers and others that have died.
“We have identified 27 secondary contacts already, we tracing the addresses of others.
“It is a tedious task, because we will also be taking their blood samples for testing and we will be monitoring them.
“We are appealing to the doctors on strike to resume work and set aside their grievances. No doubt, this situation is a dire emergency and our health professionals must recognise that.
“It will be morally unjustifiable for us to call for help from the international community if our own experts and doctors are not working.
“The bottom line is that we cannot provide the requisite expertise needed to manage these confirmed and probable cases”.
Idris said government would also be evacuating tuberculosis patients at the Infectious Diseases Hospital in Yaba, Lagos, to another hospital to accommodate more suspected and isolated cases of Ebola Virus Disease.
The commissioner said, “The TB patients at Mainland Hospital were protesting this morning but we appealed to them, that if they stay there they might be exposed and get infected.
“If we need to evacuate any hospital to ensure that we contain this disease, we will do it. If we have to take suspected cases to LASUTH, we will do it. If we need to take decisions that will be inconvenient for some people but beneficial to the larger population, we will do it. Ebola is a highly infectious disease. We will do it to contain it”.
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