By Golok Nanmwa, Jos

Plateau state Government yesterday said that it would take disciplinary action against any civil servant who refused to submit he or herself for the dreaded COVID-19 test.

Commissioner for information and Communication, Mr Dan Manjang, made this know at a press briefing at the end of an executive council meeting at Government House Jos yesterday .

He said the exercise was compulsory for them and refusal was a sign of insubordination which the Head of service of the state have been mandated to handle appropriately .

He urged the public not to stigmatise people submitting themselves for the test, saying it was not a death sentence as many infected patients had recovered from the disease.

Manjang said the executive meeting was also to review the 2020 budget downward, following the current pandemic, saying the federal allocation and the internal generated revenue had been affected.

“The budget was formerly N177.3Billion but was scaled down to N99,907Billion to make it realistically,”he said.

Commissioner for Health in the state Dr Nimkong Lar , who also spoke at the occasion said that that the state so far has conducted 9,039 COVID 19 test.

He said that “We have 7,324 results and 1,715 are pending while 571 are confirmed cases, 132 are on admission in our four treatment centres 260 discharged and so far we have recorded 16 deaths,” .

Lar also said that 57 health workers were infected of COVID-19 in Plateau.

He said the workers were infected while undergoing their legitimate duties in variously health centres.

He said they were workers managing COVID-19 patients in primary health centres, hospitals and private clinics across the state without the knowledge they were infected.

He said the state has a total of 571 confirmed cases in the state with a record of 29 cases on Tuesday , which was the highest recorded so far in the state.

He said that the state was organising community testing in the 17 Local Government Areas in the state which was voluntary, adding that it had a scheduled for conducting test in Government and Non-Government Organisations.

The Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning, Mr Sylvester Wallangko, further explained that the revised budget was in compliance with the directive to ensure that a minimum of 10 per cent budget expenditure was covid related.

“We have earmarked 10 per cent of our expenditure spread between the recurrent and capital expenditure on COVID-19 related issues which is N11.25Billion,”he said .

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COVID-19: Plateau to Take Disciplinary Action Against Civil Servant Who Refused to Conduct Test