The Edo State Government has begged its residents to strictly adhere to set guidelines to contain the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in the state.

This is coming after the death toll for the virus hit 77 in the state.

According to the commissioner for Health, Dr. Patrick Okundia, the state has recorded 5 more COVID-19-related deaths and 37 new confirmed cases.

He added that the government will keep ramping up efforts to win the war against the deadly virus.

His words, “The confirmed cases were tested at the Irrua Specialist Hospital (ISTH) laboratory and the University of Benin Teaching Hospital laboratory (38). We have now recorded a total of 2165 confirmed cases, 9950 suspected cases, 77 deaths and 1394 discharged persons.”

“The Edo State Government urges all citizens to comply with government directives, aimed at ensuring the health and safety of all Edo people.”

“While the government ramps up efforts to win the war against this deadly virus, it is vital that residents stay at home and observe social distancing guidelines and other precautionary measures against the spread of the disease, including regular handwashing with soap under running water and the use of alcohol-based hand sanitisers.”

What do you think?

Coronaviruses are a group of related viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds. In humans, coronaviruses cause respiratory tract infections that can be mild, such as some cases of the common cold (among other possible causes, predominantly rhinoviruses), and others that can be lethal, such as SARS, MERS, and COVID-19. Symptoms in other species vary: in chickens, they cause an upper respiratory tract disease, while in cows and pigs they cause diarrhea. There are yet to be vaccines or antiviral drugs to prevent or treat human coronavirus infections.

Coronaviruses constitute the subfamily Orthocoronavirinae, in the family Coronaviridae, order Nidovirales, and realm Riboviria. They are enveloped viruses with a positive-sense single-stranded RNA genome and a nucleocapsid of helical symmetry. The genome size of coronaviruses ranges from approximately 27 to 34 kilobases, the largest among known RNA viruses. The name coronavirus is derived from the Latin corona, meaning “crown” or “halo”, which refers to the characteristic appearance reminiscent of a crown or a solar corona around the virions (virus particles) when viewed under two-dimensional transmission electron microscopy, due to the surface covering in club-shaped protein spikes.

Human coronaviruses were first discovered in the late 1960s. The earliest ones discovered were an infectious bronchitis virus in chickens and two in human patients with the common cold (later named human coronavirus 229E and human coronavirus OC43). Other members of this family have since been identified, including SARS-CoV in 2003, HCoV NL63 in 2004, HKU1 in 2005, MERS-CoV in 2012, and SARS-CoV-2 (formerly known as 2019-nCoV) in 2019. Most of these have involved serious respiratory tract infections.