Lagos warns: We may soon run out of isolation beds for COVID-19 patients

164

The Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Akin Abayomi, has said the state will run out of bed spaces at isolation centres, if COVID-19 cases keep increasing.

Abayomi stated this at a press briefing in Ikeja on Friday.

In his words, “If we carry on with the rate of positive testing that we are obtaining, we’re going to run out of isolation beds in our established isolation facilities.

“Therefore, we are projecting. If we keep getting 150, 200 positives every day, in another two or three weeks, even though we’re opening new isolation centres all the time, in time, we’re going to run out of beds.

“And this has happened all over the world; it’s not just in Lagos or Nigeria. Every other country has reached the same tipping point where you now have to transition from managing patients in an isolation centre to managing patients who are not that unwell at home and reserving the isolation centres for people who are feeling unwell and need to be monitored more closely by medical personnel,” Abayomi said.

Lagos currently has the highest number of COVID-19 cases in Nigeria with 5,663.

The state recorded its highest daily toll with 378 new cases between May 30 and June 4, reaching a total of 1,165 within that time frame.