Kano has halted tests for Coronavirus amidst mystery deaths – Kwankwaso

Emmanuel Ukudolo l Monday, April 27, 2020

KANO, Nigeria – Former Governor of Kano State, Mr. Rabiu Kwankwaso has written an urgent letter to President Muhammadu Buhari intimating him of mysterious deaths in Kano and the need to take urgent action to stem the tide.

In the letter, the former governor said that hundreds of lives have been lost in the last few weeks to an unknown cause, stressing that the trend has continued even without autopsy to find out the cause of deaths.

Kwankwaso spoke just at governor of the state, Alhaji Abdullahi Ganduje has said that autopsy is ongoing and that results so far showed the deaths have nothing to do with the Coronavirus pandemic.

“Over the past week there have been reports of mysterious deaths in our great Kano State and I’m here to assure everyone that investigations are already ongoing. Autopsies are still being carried out but so far there’s been nothing to suggest that they are linked with #COVID19. To ease their burden a bit, we are currently partnering with Bayero University Kano to set up an additional Covid-19 test centre in the State”, he said, and called on the people to respect the lockdown.

In his letter, Kwankwaso diagreed with the governor, noting that the mysterious deaths have been recorded in Kano since the onset of the Coronavirus and that the governor has not been professional in the way he is handling the pandemic in the state.

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He pointed out that there is a near absence of coordination between the state government and federal agencies in the battle against the pandemic in Kano.

“Hundreds of funerals have been recorded in all the cemetaries of the eight metropolitan local governments. Looking at the patterns elsewhere in the world where senior citizens with persisting conditions were the main fatalities of the Coronavirus, we are concerned that the inability to conduct tests to determine the status of these senior citizens might be responsible for their deaths”, he said.

He said that lives of more senior citizens will be lost unless effective and urgent measures are taken to address the problem. According to him, Kano State at present has no COVID-19 Response Committee, adding that the existing committee was nothing but a contraption of cronies who are incompetent and unqualified.

“As such, they kowtow to the whims of politicians without any regards to professional healthcare consideration. The committee technically disbanded itself when majority of the members tested positive for COVID-19”, he said.

“I should inform Mr. President that since the announcement of the positive results of the members, no test was ever conducted in the state again. This is very frightening as neither asymptomatic nor active cases are being identified and isolated as such carriers of the dreaded virus are all about spreading it and causing untimely deaths, especially of our senior citizens, “, Kwankwaso alleged.

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He said the stoppage of the tests, persistent demand for financial assistant by the Kano State Government and revelation at Isolation centres in Kano has deepened the already mistrust between the government and the governed.

He said that right from the first index case in Kano, the state government has been at war with the National Centre for Disease Control(NCDC) which has been charged with the responsibility of COVID-19 as it is done elsewhwere.

He called on the Presidential Task Force to dispatch medical personnel to all cemetaries to collect records of deaths, with another team to follow up on the cause of deaths adding that those who did the burial, and those who prepared the dead bodies should be identified and isolated along with their contacts.

He said that the state and federal government must treat all dead bodies as if they are COVID-19 related at this moment.