Fola Ojo
It commenced as a localised endemic in Wuhan, China. From there, its mangling metastasis hit South Korea, Italy, Japan, Iran, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Few weeks after, it spiralled down into a few African nations including my beloved Nigeria. The manifestation of the novel disease coronavirus or COVID-19, did not consciously hit the world until around January, this year. In the aftermath, humanity slid into a panic mode. From a few numbers of cases, headcounts from the effects of the rabid virus shot up into thousands infected, and thousands more human beings losing the breath of life. While developed nations with cutting edge healthcare system were and are still counting horror numbers in citizens infected, hospitalised, and dead, Nigeria is recording far lower even than an average nation whose citizens are in strict obedience to preventative protocols against the virus.
Recently, I saw a picture of some family members in an event in Lagos where no single person had a mask even in their pockets. They left their homes with no shred of thoughts about the dangers of COVID-19. While the mask-culture has become a lifestyle in America where I live, what I observe in Nigeria makes me think that the country must not be on planet earth. I asked my sister why nobody had a mask on. She responded: “Boda mi, there is no koro in Naija oooo. Koro is dead”. I asked a few pastor friends of mine who live in Nigeria. Many of them had similar responses: “It’s God oooo. We have prayed Koro away from Naija”. Do we not pray in America; or my friends in the United Kingdom don’t know how to seek God’s face? Does God hate the rest of the world where men are bundled in body-bags and six feet below as a result of COVID-19? Please somebody tell me what is the magic against COVID-19 in Nigeria? Is it God; or voodoo arithmetic headcount? It has to be God, indeed!
According to Nigerian government data, as of today, about 57,000 cases have been recorded, 44, 000 have recovered, and 1,088 deaths. I still want to know the Nigerian magic against COVID-19. People cluster in markets with no masks. They agglutinate at feverish owambe parties without facial coverings. They dance; they sing; they carry on as if nothing is in the air. Where masks are worn, they are like malfunction wardrobes. Coverings are strapped around the chin, neck, mouth, leaving the nostrils wide open for deadly droplets to inhabit their nasal cavities. And you believe coronavirus cases are accurately rock-bottom low in Naija? Is this God; or voodoo arithmetic headcounts? It must be God!
When I think about how Nigeria arrested Ebola Virus Disease at its killer throes, a part of me wants to stand in obeisance to Nigeria’s unusual tactics and strategies arresting ravaging viruses. It truly must be God. An infected Liberian man who arrived Lagos by air brought Ebola virus into Nigeria on July 20, 2014. Five days later, the man died. But he had already set off a raging fire of the virus in Nigeria’s commercial capital with about 23 million people. Who in Nigeria will forget Dr. Ameyo Stella Adadevoh, the Lead Consultant Physician and Endocrinologist at a private hospital in Lagos? Adadevoh had never seen Ebola before but was able to diagnose and contain Nigeria’s first-ever Ebola patient. The outbreak was effectively controlled by authorities garnering support from the private sector and international community. Eight people died; and 12 infected were nursed back to good health.
Reports of the effect of COVID-19 in Africa, especially in Nigeria, have shocked scientists around the world. Factors like population density; and crowding in poverty-stricken neighbourhoods that make social distancing impossible should have been scientifically considered enhancers and facilitators of a wild and wide spread of the virus. But these factors have obviously worked in the opposite direction. The expectation all along had been that Nigeria should be one of the worst-hit; but that is not the case. Nigeria is doing better than many nations both with regard to cases and casualties. Experts around the world also agree that even if cases are underreported in Nigeria, the nation is doing well regarding her approach to COVID-19.
The UK’s top virologist Professor Shabir Madhi told the BBC News regarding COVID-19 and Africa: “I thought we were heading towards a disaster, a complete meltdown.” The UK’s top virologist echoed what others must have thought about the African coronavirus outbreak. Earlier this year, the monster-virus sneaked into Nigeria from Europe and the UK en-route the United States. Travellers from these two hotspots who were determined to circumvent America’s travel ban order on their citizens took advantage of Nigeria’s Business e-visa initiative rolled out last year to ease international business.
It allows business investors to apply online for a visa before travelling to Nigeria. These cruel and crafty travellers from the UK and other European countries exploited the loophole to facilitate their travels through the Delta Airlines’ direct flight to Atlanta. When I received this information, I quickly contacted Nigeria’s Interior Minister, Rauf Aregbesola, about considering shutting down the nation’s borders to people travelling by air from outside of the country who might be carriers of the deadly virus. Three days after, the Federal Government announced a travel restriction to passengers from 13 countries attempting to enter Nigeria.
For those Nigerians who are still downplaying the gruesomeness of this virus, rethink. Ask those who have seen the virus in action with its terror fangs. Ask anyone who has once experienced it; or who knows someone in the cruel claws of the pandemic. I am sure their testaments will give you a clearer picture of the virulence of the virus. To my sister who said that God has killed COVID-19 in Nigeria, I say a loud Amen! She knows I also believe in God. And I also believe in God’s word that says “Wisdom is the principal thing, therefore get wisdom…” Wisdom is not the vice-principal, or deputy to anything. It is the main thing. It is the Commander-In-Chief. That is why for now, until the world gets a medicinal intervention or preventative vaccine, when you find yourself in a large gathering of people, strap on your mask, stay six-feet distant from the next person; and sanitise your hands often.
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