Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) Director-General,Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu  speaking during an interview on Thursday reminded Nigerians not to expect lifestyle to return to the way it’s used to be after overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic.

While noting the effect of the movement restriction order on  commercial activities especially,  the NCDC Boss said “Life will never be the same, it will not be the same and Nigerians have to prepare for a different type of life once the lockdown starts and that’s really my big message today; life will not be the same as we knew it before COVID-19 – a lot of changes that we have introduced into the society will have to continue in the short term.”

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According to him, the Nigerian Government through the NCDC is making efforts to control the further spread of the disease, even as he must con fess isn’t an easy task.

“We have responded to Lassa smoothly and nobody shut down the country because it wasn’t necessary, the response was fairly efficient. “Now, COVID-19 is on a much larger scale – at the moment in 22 states but it will grow to every state in Nigeria, there is no reason why it won’t.”

Dr Ihekweazu emphasised that Nigerian can’t change the COVID-19 happenings but can work with the National Health Agency (NCDC) to achieve a positive recovery. “We just activated the lab in Kano a few days ago. So, these are the results of the increased testing capacity that we are providing for the country. The tests are fairly robust; I can’t say 100 per cent but they are as close to that as possible. We had the highest number of positive cases in a single day. Since the onset of the outbreak, we are testing a lot more (and) that is beginning to show. It is only so much we can do from NCDC; we are working with the state governments.

“They actually own the response at the state and local levels, and we need all of them now. We really have to face the reality that this is an outbreak, this is a virus. It will circulate in Nigeria, absolutely no doubt and our responsibility as a country is to prepare more, to be able to detect, isolate, treat, list contacts, and stop transmission,” he concluded.