NCDC DG: Why some COVID-19 patients dance in isolation centres

Chikwe Ihekweazu, director-general of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), says some COVID-19 patients dance in isolation centres because the disease may not weaken some people’s body system as badly as others.

Speaking during a Channels TV programme on Thursday, Ihekweazu said their confinement is not only because of their sickness but to prevent them from spreading the virus.

He, however, added that most of the patients at isolation centres are complying with the guidelines at the centres.

He said: “I think people really need to understand why people are being put in these centres. Normally, you only go into a hospital when you’re ill, get a diagnosis, and then you are sometimes admitted if you’re very ill.

“But in this case, following the experience from other countries, we made a decision as a country to also put people in isolation centres not just because they are ill on their own but in order to stop them from transmitting this virus to others.”

He recalled that some persons being quarantined when he visited China “could exercise and dance because it is not easy to be somewhere, in isolation for three to four weeks when you are not physically ill”.

“So, these are things we have to use to reassess our decisions. It is very difficult to make decisions based on one viral video. One Whatsapp video does not represent the experience of people across the country,” the NCDC DG added.

“It is very important that as leaders we are not pushed down a decision path because one video happened to go viral. Many people in these centres around the country are complying.”