The government of Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu in Lagos State has approved that three private hospitals in the state be permitted to handle treatment of COVID-19 cases.
This comes in the wake of warning by government that it may run out of bed spaces for COVID-19 patients within the next three weeks if the current rate of infection persists.
The Lagos State Government did not name the accredited hospitals but the Ministry of Health said in a statement on Saturday that one of them had started admitting patients.
The remaining two are to start admission and management of patients soon.
“They have passed the biosecurity compliance test. They have made modifications to their hospitals so that their staff and other patients are not put in danger or exposed to a higher risk of contracting COVID-19,” the ministry quoted Health Commissioner Akin Abayomi as saying.
He added: “Those private hospitals have passed the test and we are just in the process of issuing them with accreditation certificate so that they can start managing COVID19 patients in the private sector.
“However, even if they are managing COVID19 in the private sector, it still comes under the supervision of the Lagos State Government Ministry of Health.
“Also, information about every patient managed by the hospitals must be made available to us so that we can record it in our database.
“COVID-19 remains a public crisis and all public crises are managed and supervised by the Lagos State Government and by extension the Federal Government of Nigeria.”
Credit: thenationonlineng.net
