We lack adequate staff strength- NCDC boss, Chikwe Ihekweazu

Director-General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Chikwe Ihekweazu has decried the lack of staff strength in the fight against COVID-19.

Stating some of his worries about the process, he revealed that the challenge is how active the public workforce is in collecting samples and sending them in.

Noting that testing capacities have been ramped up in the state, the DG said they can now test for 1,500 persons.

"We are eyeing having testing laboratories in every state. We can test 1,500 per day but it's not been fully utilised. The challenge is how active our public workforce is in collecting samples and sending them in," Ihekweazu said.

Revealing how his Easter celebration was spent restrategizing, he said they were looking at increasing the number of testing per day. Something that cannot achieve at present.

"We have the capacity but not the staff. We eye 2,000 in Lagos, 1,000 in Abuja and a 1,000 in every part of the country. Our priority is to increase the scale of testing. We are developing innovative tools to track all of it," the NCDC boss stressed.