The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has claimed that the country is yet to record any death due to COVID-19 with the B.1.1.529 SARS-CoV-2 lineage, which is the Omicron variant.
The NCDC Director-General, Dr Ifedayo Adetifa, stated this on Friday while speaking to newsmen in Abuja.
NAN reports that data from the African Union (AU) shows that the Omicron variant of the coronavirus is spreading rapidly across the African continent.
AU’s Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said as of Thursday, that 22 countries have reported the presence of the Omicron variant.
“We can see clearly that Omicron is spreading very quickly,” said John Nkengasong of the CDC.
Around a month after South Africa first discovered the more infectious variant, it has now been detected as far as Egypt, Togo, Morocco, Kenya, Mauritius and Burkina Faso.
Nkengasong said there are grounds for optimism, pointing to initial findings from South Africa that Omicron posed up to 80 per cent less risk of severe disease compared to the Delta variant.
