By ABUJAH RACHEAL

Five more people have died from COVID-19 complications as Nigeria recorded 559 fresh cases on Thursday, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) said in its infections update published on its Facebook page on Friday.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the additional 727 COVID-19 infections, on Thursday, indicated an increase over the 559 cases reported on Wednesday and was attributed to the third wave surge caused by the highly transmissible Delta variant and low vaccination rates across the country.

The NCDC noted that Nigeria’s COVID-19 cases had jumped to 197, 773 on Thursday .

To date, it said that 2,585 persons have died due to complications from the disease and that Thursday’s infections were confirmed in 17 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

“The 727 new cases are reported from 18 states – Rivers (257), Lagos (157), Edo (85), Imo (63), FCT (33), Delta (28), Kaduna (27), Benue (17), Akwa Ibom (13) Ekiti (13), Taraba (12), Bayelsa (5), Kano (4), Ogun (4), Oyo (3), Abia, Nasarawa and Plateau reported two each respectively.

“Our today’s report includes; 12 positive cases for Taraba state are for Sept. 7. Cases for Edo state are backlogs from Sept., 7, Sept. 8 and Sept. 9.

“Zero cases were reported from Ondo, Osun and Sokoto states, “it stated.

The NCDC said that the active coronavirus cases in Nigeria were 9,089, with a total of 182,597 cases successfully treated and discharged after recovery as at Sept. 9.

It said that over 2. 8 million samples of the virus out of the nation’s roughly 200 million population were tested as the multi-sectoral national emergency operations centre (EOC), activated at Level 2, continued to coordinate the national response activities.

Meanwhile, the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has reported, in its COVID-19 national vaccination update, that 3,812,120 of the total eligible persons targeted for COVID-19 vaccination had been reached with the first dose.

While 1,633,799 of the total eligible persons targeted for COVID-19 vaccination had been reached with the second dose and were now “fully vaccinated”.

“Vaccines safeguards children and makes them healthy, happy and disease-free.

“MDAs, public and private corporate organisation that require staff to be vaccinated should visit www.nphcda.gov.ng to fill the request form.

“These services would be provided at no cost to the Ministries, agency and cooperate bodies.

“States and LGAs should please note that no fees/levies should be mandated from the cooperate bodies when teams are sent to provide these services,” it stated.

The immunisation agency said if Nigerians with enquiries and concerns about the COVID-19 vaccination, should call the NPHCDA helpline on – 0700 220 1122, however, it advised that the helpline should be used responsibly. (NAN)

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