A total of 1,149 new cases of the covid-19 disease were recorded in Nigerian on Wednesday, 18th August 2021. This was disclosed by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on their website.
According to the disclosure, 1,149 new cases and 7 deaths were recorded across 17 states of the federation including the federal capital, with Lagos State recording the highest with 680 new cases. The number of cases represents the highest recorded in over 6 months.
The last time Nigeria recorded daily new cases over 1,149 was in February 2021, when it recorded 1,368 new cases in a day, during the second wave of the pandemic in the country. The recent turn of events shows that Nigeria is currently grappling with the third wave of the pandemic.
A cursory look at the historic data compiled by Nairametrics Research, revealed that a total of 10,685 cases of the covid-19 has been recorded so far in the month of August 2021.
As of the time of writing this article, Nigeria has recorded a total of 184,593 cases of the disease from inception to date, the 10th highest in Africa, behind Algeria and Zambia.
So far, 167,738 patients have been discharged, leaving 14,619 active cases still on admission. Meanwhile, there have been 2,236 casualties from the disease, which represents 1.21% mortality rate per 100 infected persons.
Meanwhile, the 1,149 new cases are reported from 16 states- Lagos (680), Rivers (157), Akwa Ibom (94), Oyo (56), Edo (36), FCT (34), Ogun (31), Ekiti (20), Delta (16), Abia (5), Nasarawa (5), Osun (5), Cross River (4), Plateau (3), Sokoto (2) and Kano (1).
Nigeria receives fresh 699,760 vaccines
The federal government earlier in the week formally announced the delivery of 699,760 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines, which were donated by the UK government.
Also recall, that Nigeria had also received 4 million doses of Moderna vaccines earlier in the month, summing up to about 4.6 million doses in total.
With Nigeria’s large population and vaccination still yet to cover a large proportion of the population, the spike in the number of cases is a cause for worry, as it could suggest new lockdown measures for the country. A situation that did not go well with the country’s economy the last time.