Nigeria Reports 238 New Cases Of COVID-19 As Death Toll Rise To 68

Nigeria has recorded 238 new cases of COVID-19 as deaths rose to 68, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) said in a tweet on Friday.

The new cases bring the country’s number of total infections to 2,170.

238 new cases of #COVID19;

92-Kano
36-FCT
30-Lagos
16-Gombe
10-Bauchi
8-Delta
6-Oyo
5-Zamfara
5-Sokoto
4-Ondo
4-Nasarawa
3-Kwara
3-Edo
3-Ekiti
3-Borno
3-Yobe
2-Adamawa
1-Niger
1-Imo
1-Ebonyi
1-Rivers
1-Enugu

For the second consecutive day, Kano recorded the highest number of cases in the country with 92 infections. The FCT posted 36 cases and Lagos reported 30.

The number of infections has risen due to the increased capacity for testing across the country, the NCDC has said.

Earlier on Friday, the NCDC Director-General, Chikwe Ihekweazu said at a press briefing Nigeria had tested about 2,000 samples on Thursday, the country’s highest in one day.

On Tuesday, the NCDC announced it has set the target of testing two million people within the next three months.

Experts believe cases will continue to rise as more testing is carried out.

Meanwhile, the novel coronavirus has killed at least 235,519 people since the outbreak first emerged in China in December, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP at 8pm on Friday.

More than 3,303,510 cases were registered in 195 countries and territories. Of these cases, at least 1,003,600 are now considered recovered.

The tallies, using data collected by AFP from national authorities and information from the World Health Organization (WHO), probably reflect only a fraction of the actual number of infections.

Many countries are testing only the most serious cases.

Since 8pm on Thursday, 3,982 new deaths and 70,199 new infections were recorded worldwide.

The countries that registered the most deaths over the 24 hours were Britain with 739, Brazil with 435 and Spain with 281.

The United States has the highest number of total deaths with 63,127 out of 1,082,411 cases. At least 159,663 have been declared recovered.

Italy has the second-highest toll with 28,236 deaths out of 207,428 cases, followed by Britain with 27,510 deaths on 177,454 cases, Spain 24,824 deaths and 215,216 cases and France with 24,594 deaths and 167,346 cases.

The country with the highest proportion of fatalities per population is Belgium, with 66 deaths per 100,000 people, followed by Spain with 53, Italy with 47, Britain with 41 and France with 38.

China — excluding Hong Kong and Macau — has to date declared 4,633 deaths and 82,874 cases. It has 77,642 recovered cases.

Europe has a total of 140,101 deaths from 1,495,563 cases, the United States and Canada have 66,589 deaths and 1,137,191 cases, Latin America and the Caribbean have 11,548 deaths and 218,824 cases, Asia has 8,727 deaths and 227,471 cases, the Middle East has 6,791 deaths and 176,715 cases, Africa has 1,645 deaths from 39,668 cases, and Oceania 118 deaths from 8,086 cases.