Lockdown imminent in Ogun as residents shun COVID19 protocols

 By Moshood Adebayo

Amid non-compliance by residents with the rules and guidelines on the pandemic Coronavirus in Ogun State, the state government may be forced to reintroduce lockdown.

Sources close to the Oke Mosan office of the Ministry of Health, hinted that the government was not particularly happy with the non challant attitude of residents to the second wave of the dreaded virus disease.

Figures from the Nigeria Centre For Disease Control in the past weeks ranked the state among those with rising cases of the second wave of the disease, which continued to claim eminent Nigerians.

It is a common thing to see residents at public places, including markets and garages  going about without using facemask or observe the COVID 19 protocols including the social distance.

‘’I must tell you that the state government is not particularly happy with the way residents is treating the second wave of the disease with levity, particularly with the noncompliance of the guidelines by the Federal Task Force on the disease’’

The source added: ‘’the government may be left with no other option than to re-introduce tougher measures, including probably another lockdown if the need arises’’

‘’No serious government will fold its arms and allow sentiment to cloud its reasoning, particularly when the issue has to do with the health and safety of her people.

‘’The government will continue to appeal to them to see reasons for complying with the established rules and guidelines, but if they fail, it may wax the big stick of total lockdown again.

Commissioner for Health, Dr. Tomi Coker, during the 2021 budget defence session recently disclosed that the state recorded 33 deaths, screens over 42,000 since the deadly disease broke out in the state.

She added that the state government had put in place strategies to combat and flatten the curves of the second wave of the pandemic in the state.

Coker also told the lawmakers that the government was already exploring the Public Private Partnership arrangements to engage interested private developmental partners for the effective running of the 250-bed hospital project along Oke Mosan road Abeokuta.

According to her, the Dapo Abiodun-led administration had initiated measures to improve on the testing capacity carried out across the 20 council areas.

Against the wrong notion that the state had totally closed its various isolation centres, the commissioner said this was not so.

While explaining that the state decided to close those that were underutilized to properly utilize funds and manpower, she added that it would review its COVID-19 operations in the first week of the new year for effective assessment of its various facilities.