The Federal Government is currently working towards ensuring that 3,500 tests are carried out daily across the country to ascertain citizens’ COVID-19 status.
It planned to achieve the new figure from the current 2,500 per day within a timeline of 30 days.
This is aimed at addressing the concerns that the tests so far carried out in Nigeria are far fewer than the ones conducted in some other African countries.
The plan to increase the nation’s testing capacity is contained in a document, ‘National Strategy to Scale Up Access to Coronavirus Disease Testing in Nigeria,’ prepared by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
The centre stated the objectives of the national strategy as, “To increase testing capacity from nine laboratories in six states to at least 15 laboratories in 12 states and the FCT.
“To increase national testing output from 2,500 tests a day to at least 3,500 tests per day across the country.”
According to the document, the NCDC is currently working with state governments and other tertiary health facilities to identify other laboratories with required capacities such as existing PCR capacity and biosafety level 2 cabinets to roll out testing, leveraging existing laboratories for VHF and polio.