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HEALTH-VIRUS-NIGERIA
Nigeria confirms coronavirus case, first in sub-Saharan Africa: minister
LAGOS, Feb 28, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – Nigeria on Friday announced the first
confirmed case of the novel coronavirus in sub-Saharan Africa.
“The case is an Italian citizen who works in Nigeria and returned from
Milan, Italy to Lagos, Nigeria on the 25th of February 2020,” Health Minister
Osagie Ehanire said in a statement on Twitter.
“The patient is clinically stable, with no serious symptoms, and is being
managed at the Infectious Disease Hospital in Yaba, Lagos.”
Prior to the case in Nigeria, just two cases had surfaced across all of
Africa — in Egypt and in Algeria — a tally that had puzzled health
specialists, given the continent’s close economic ties with China.
The World Health Organization warned earlier this week that African health
systems were ill-equipped to respond to the deadly coronavirus outbreak
should cases start to proliferate on the continent.
BSS/AFP/GMR/0846 hrs