The World Health Organisation’s Special Envoy for Access to the COVID-19 Tools Accelerator, Dr Ayoade Alakija, has said the portal provided by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control for the payment for Polymerase Chain Reaction tests by travellers is defective.
The WHO envoy, in a tweet via her official Twitter handle, stated that travellers sometimes had to pay multiple times to be able to generate Quick Response codes.
The PUNCH had, on Friday, reported that Alakija called for an investigation of the NCDC and the Ministry of Health over the required COVID-19 PCR tests for inbound passengers.
She wondered why the PCR tests were done with no reagents.
The NCDC Director-General, Ifedayo Adetifa, had insisted that the country would not scrap the COVID-19 tests for inbound passengers into the country.
Adetifa said the country was reporting a high rate of COVID-19 cases from inbound passengers, hence the need for the insistence of the tests.
In reaction, Alakija tweeted, “The portal for PCR tests is defective, people sometimes have to pay several times before it will generate QR code. It is a reputation issue for Nigeria and is a scam.”
A civil society organisation, ActionAid, had, on Saturday, called on the Federal Government to reduce the high rate of the PCR tests for inbound travellers.
The organisation also berated the government, adding that the high cost of the PCR tests was a lucrative business for rich people in the country.
Copyright PUNCH.
All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from PUNCH.
Contact: [email protected]
