COVID-19 PANDEMIC IN NIGERIA: IMPACT, CONTAINMENT AND INTERVENTION

Abstract

This paper as a historical study, focused on the epistemology of COVID-19 in the Nigerian Healthcare System, its effects and responses. The main objective is to have a full grasp of the knowledge, features, mode of its spread and the effects of COVID-19 pandemic on Nigerian households and the entire national economy as well as the response of both the government and the entire people of Nigeria, this refers to the efforts in containment of the virus and the concomitant lockdown. This study adopted the conventional content analysis method and traced the origin and knowledge of the operations of the virus, noting its devastating effect on Nigerian households. The study found out that the mode of the spread of the virus, posed a very serious medical and health challenge to the Nigerian medical and health workers as their facilities were not only inadequate but were in short supply with near absence of state-of-the-art equipment. The government response was limited to mere preventive approach without full knowledge of the transmission mode of the virus, as the medical team were not prepared to handle a large-scale pandemic issue due to limited knowledge, thus the shallow response but that they were also overwhelmed in almost all the States. The study therefore, recommended that the response of the government should not only be limited to food hand out as palliatives but should go beyond that to include, proper research on the virus, stimulus package and tax relief for businesses as response, reduction in cost of prices of such commodities as petroleum products, power and energy supply, improved welfare packages for the Civil and Public servants despite shut down of schools and government offices.