Tension is building up in Anambra state since the COVID-19 index case was reportedly caught and kept in one of the isolation centres in the state.
Blueprint learnt that the index case, a business tycoon and politician whose sample test result was confirmed positive by NCDC on April 10 had returned from trip oversea to Lagos from where he later returned to Anambra state despite closure of the state borders.
Anambra state had been in lockdown since March 29. It was also gathered that since he returned he had been to several hospitals for different treatments, as well attended several meetings both in his community (name withheld), Awka and Onitsha.
“He didn’t disclose his travel history when he came. It was his son that he came with that confirmed to us that he had been to UK this year and also returned from Lagos. He was shutdown in his wall and NCDC was contacted. After taking his blood for sample he insisted that he would go; paid his bill and left despite medical advice.
“That was why the news in the social media suggest that he ran away. That name you see on the social media is his real name. People are doing that out of frustration. That man has infected most of his community members and health workers. His first contacts like health workers that attended to him and their families are panicking and running ” the source alleged.
But the Anambra state commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment, Mr C. Don Adinuba, who disputed the details of the index case in circulation on social media, urged the public and media to leave the patient alone, adding that he was recuperating in an undisclosed isolation centre.
However, the state commissioner for Health, Dr Vincent Okpala, on Monday, confirmed that 29 persons including health workers, relations and business partners of the COVID-19 index case have been quarantined and were waiting to be tested.
Okpala said, “I went with the team to places I ordinarily would not go at that time of the night (8pm to 3am), and I knocked on a lot of doors to wake people up from sleep to ask about the individual. He left the hospital when he should not have left, and usually, while waiting for patient’s result, we keep them in check, but this man eloped even before the result was out, and when I called the doctor managing him, and he told me the man was not in the hospital, we had to go looking for him.
“Presently, the index case is being treated at an isolation centre, and he is receiving the best of treatment ever. He has every facility he needs and is also provided whatever he wants. Contact tracing is on vigorously, and we have 29 persons who are contacts of the index case, and they include medical personnel at the hospital where he was being previously managed, his relatives and business associates. Those traced are being closely monitored now. The hospital where the case was previously treated has been fumigated, and people should feel free to use the facility.”
The state governor, Willie Obiano, had on Saturday extended the total lockdown and closure of border, urging the law enforcement agents to arrest and prosecute whoever violates the order.
As a result, both people and vehicular movements had been restricted since Sunday.
