The federal government has attributed the low number of people tested for coronavirus in the country to the capacity of the testing equipment in use.
READ ALSO: FG warn against using Kano-made COVID-19 vaccine
The Presidential Taskforce on COVID-19 explained this on Tuesday at its daily routine press briefing in Abuja against the backdrop of the country’s underwhelming performance in the number of tested persons for the pandemic even in comparison with African countries.
While countries like Ghana and Egypt have screened 60,916 and 55,000 people respectively, according to www.worldometers.info, Nigeria has tested only 8,000 persons.
In defence of the low figure, the Minister of State for Health, Olorunnimbe Mamora said it was down to the testing method adopted by the country and initial challenge in the number of laboratories in place.
Mamora explained that the method has no room for error unlike those used in some other climes.
He said: “The limitation we have is that more laboratories are being opened because the PCR-based testing method that we use may not give us the mass testing that we really require. We are limited because we are not using the rapid test kit because it has not been certified by the WHO. We take it as a challenge that the NCDC is working on.
“Recall that we started with five laboratories and now we have 13 PCR-based laboratories. I also recall that the Director General of the NCDC has said the challenge now is to have people coming out for testing. In spite of 13 laboratories we have for testing in Nigeria, we can test more (than we do now) if people show up to be tested.”
