Lagos State government has announced that in view of the increased workload of medical workers in the state, their allowances would be increased for the month of April.
The Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, stated this via his Twitter handle.
“Because I have increased their workload this month, there is a plan that I will also increase their individual allowances this month, for every of our health workers irrespective of whether they are on the frontline, or they are just treating somebody that has malaria,” he stated.
Answering questions yesterday about Lagos state's front line health workers helping us stop the spread of #COVID19 .
Their commitment, bravery and passion has been amazing and they deserve all we can do and so much more.
We are a team and together we will protect our residents pic.twitter.com/m4YUHsHtDD
— Babajide Sanwo-Olu (@jidesanwoolu) April 21, 2020
To make up for the dwindling supply of face masks, the Lagos State government has also commissioned local production of face masks which would be certified by professionals before distribution.
(READ MORE: COVID-19: Lagos discharges 5 patients on Easter Sunday)
Governor Sanwo-Olu announced this development via his Twitter handle, on Sunday evening.
We have commissioned local production of face masks certified by our healthcare professionals for our residents.
Let us not give into panic buying and opportunistic price gouging which will deny our frontline healthcare workers of masks and other PPEs required to fight #COVID19.
— Babajide Sanwo-Olu (@jidesanwoolu) April 20, 2020
Sanwo-Olu urged Lagos residents to desist from panic buying when the face masks are made available, in order to prevent price gouging which will deny health care worker access to the needed supplies.
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Why this is necessary
Countries across the world had placed restrictions on exports of medical supplies to ensure that they have sufficient supply for domestic use.
This action has led to scarcity of the needed supplies in Africa and unnecessary price hikes, causing the African countries to explore alternative options such as local production of face masks and re-purposing garment factories to produce protective wears (PPEs).
The production and subsequent enforcement of the use of face masks is expected to further reduce the rate of community transmission, and help the state return to normal operations in due time.
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Lagos is now seeing a slow spread of community transmission of COVID19 and as such we are considering mandatory use of face masks in our plan to contain #COVID19.
The rise in new cases is as a success of our house-to-house contact tracing and ramping up of tests across 20 LGAs. pic.twitter.com/qzjwvGz7pB
— Babajide Sanwo-Olu (@jidesanwoolu) April 20, 2020