The federal government said it is yet to receive a report from research centres about efficacy of the purported coronavirus herbal cure imported from Madagascar.

The Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire said, “We do not have any information yet. We have given them to our research centres and they are working on them. None of them has reported back yet.

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“The time it will take for all these researches is not what we know, but I think after a period, I will reach out to them to find out if they can give me an interim report” he said.

Ehanire who disclosed this on Thursday in Abuja while answering questions at the 42nd joint national briefing of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19 threatened to withdraw the licenses of medical doctors who deliberately reject and turn back patients from their hospital without attending to them or offering necessary advice on what to do over the COVID-19 scare.

According to him, it as unethical and unacceptable, doctors who engage in such unprofessional conduct will be reported to the Nigeria Medical, and Dental Council, and if found guilty would have their licenses withdrawn.

He advised anyone who is rejected at any hospital or medical facility to write and complain to the board of such hospital, the Federal Ministry of Health, or the state ministry of health in case of state hospitals.

“It is unethical to reject patients who come to the hospital for treatment. I have said here repeatedly that every person who comes to the hospital must be seen and attended to and at least, be given advice on what to do.

“If you can’t do it, advise him on where to go or call transport for him. But to just say go, we don’t handle that is not ethical, and it is not acceptable.

“So, if that happens anywhere, you have the authority to write to the board of that hospital and lay complain.

“Or you can also write to the ministry of health, or you can write to the state ministry of health if it is a state-owned hospital. If it is a private hospital, you can write to the medical director or if they have a management board, you can write there to express yourself.

“This is very important. So, we do receive cases or complaints like that and we have always followed them up and in cases where it is proven that there is an infringement on the duties of the doctor it is referred to the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria and it is well known that they have gone to as far as withdrawing licenses of doctors for cases of very serious medical misbehaviour,” Ehanire said.

He also said that there is a possibility of a new strain of the deadly COVID-19 in the country as a result of mutation, probably from people who recently returned from other countries.

He said, “As for the strain of COVID-19, yes, when Nigerians were coming back in batches from different countries, US, Saudi Arabia, Europe, China, the question did arise and some of them tested positive for COVID-19.

“The question did arise about whether the strain of COVID-19 they have is the same one that was known. The National Institute of Pharmaceutical Research and Development (NIPRD) did a genome sequencing of the virus of the index case that came long ago; this is the first in Africa.

“It was confirmed to be the same strain as what was circulating in Italy and China. So, we raised the question whether there has been mutation since then in people coming from other areas,” he said.

He, however, said he did not have any information on that yet, but that it is suspected that it is possible.

He said it is not yet updated but was sure that research centres in Yaba, Lagos and the one in Ede, Osun State, are trying to do a sequencing that will show whether all these viruses are the same or whether they have a different sequencing.

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COVID-19: FG gives update on Madagascar herb