Govt can’t risk reopening schools now, says education minister

Nigeria’s Minister of State for Education, Emeka Nwajiuba has said that the Federal Ministry of Education would not risk reopening schools across the country, until all preventive measures had been put in place.

According to him, various dates of resumption being circulated in some quarters were false, adding that the government would consider introducing afternoon classes to ease rowdiness.

Nwajiuba said, “We want to say that the announcement that we are reopening all schools on June 8 did not emanate from us. That is not true; until we are sure that these children can go to school, return safely and not bring home with them this COVID-19 material.

“So we are not taking that risk yet. We are going to prepare as much as possible within the guidance that we are offered, working in conjunction with the World Health Organisation, before we reopen schools.”

The Director General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, said new studies showed that the novel coronavirus had a viability period of a maximum of 10 days.

Ihekweazu stated, “One of the merits over the last few days is (that) detection of fragments of this virus, over time, doesn’t in itself mean that there is an active virus, over time.

“Studies have now shown, using this PCR test, in addition to something we call ‘viral culture,’ day to day, that the longest viability period of the virus is about 10 days, maximum.”

He said, in some of the “celebrated” COVID-19 cases, the Federal Government could not discharge those patients at the time because they did not know how long the virus remain viable.

On the situation in Kogi State, the NCDC DG said the centre would provide support to states that sought it. He said, “We are focused on supporting all the states in the country and our focus will continue to be states requesting and the people living in those states.

“Almost every day, I get calls from governors pushing for labs, treatment centres, commodities, IPC (infection prevention and control), technical support, guidance (and) knowledge.”

While fielding questions, he spoke on the isolation and discharge of recent evacuees to Nigeria, saying none of the United Kingdom evacuees isolated in Abuja, who returned on May 8, was positive.

Three out of the 256 Nigerians evacuated from Dubai on May 7 had tested positive for COVID-19 in Lagos. But Ihekweazu said, “We had only three positives from that first flight that came through Lagos. All the ones that were tested in Abuja over the last few days have been negative and discharged home to rejoin their families.”

According to him, the Federal Government has procured reagents that are sufficient to test more than 100,000 persons. He said, “We have reagents in our stockpile to test over 100,000 people. So, the challenge now is not reagent. The challenge is really to work with states to reinvigorate the sample collection process.”

When asked to provide updates on the situation in Bonny Island, Rivers States, where at least 11 reportedly died in strange circumstances, Ihekweazu stated that a team had been deployed to collect samples for testing.

The NCDC boss stated that costs per test were sometimes not as simple as one would think, adding it depended on what one included in the cost. The Lagos State Government, last Thursday, said it had conducted 16,000 COVID-19 tests at the average cost of between N40,000 and N50,000, adding that it had spent about N800m on testing alone.