Activities at the Mother and Child Hospital in Akure, the Ondo State capital was partially grounded on Tuesday following a peaceful protest by nurses at the medical facility.
According to the nurses, the spike in the cases of COVID-19 among health workers without efforts by government to carry out contact tracing of infected persons is worrisome.
The nurses who were chanting solidarity songs displayed placards with various inscription such as “Nurses’ lives matter,” “Don’t you think I am worth being protected?” “Who is next?” “NCDC, urgent attention needed now.”
Journalists gathered that workers at the State Neuropsychiatric hospital, Akure have also stopped coming to work as a result of the same issue.
Over 10 nurses and five doctors with other health workers have contracted the deadly COVID-19 in the state in the last one week.
According to the State Chairman of the National Association of Nigerian Nurses and Midwives (NANNM), Comrade Kehinde Nomiye and Mrs Tayo Imorua who is also a union leader, the protest was sparked by the failure of the state government and the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, NCDC, to carry out contact tracing of an infected doctor and nurse at the mother and child hospital.
The union leaders disclosed that contact tracing had yet to commence on the cases which were detected more than 98 hours ago.
They stated that with the development, nurses and patients at the hospital are now at risk of the deadly disease.
While giving the state government 48 hours to yield to their demands, they threatened to withdraw their services from the ward.
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