The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) says it has activated three additional laboratories, bringing the total number that can carry out PCR testing for Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in Nigeria to 33. Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu, the Director-General of NCDC, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Abuja that the health agency had stayed on track in its goal to rapidly scale up laboratory testing for COVID-19 in Nigeria. He said that NCDC was currently using the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) method to test for the COVID-19 virus, in the absence of validated alternative methods. ”By the end of June, our goal is to include at least 10 more laboratories with current Gene-Xpert capacity in the network for COVID-19 testing,” Ihekweazu said. The director-general noted that PCR tests could be very labour intensive, with several stages at which errors might occur between sampling and analysis.

Source: The Guardian June 09, 2020 18:56 UTC