How Oyo First COVID-19 Fatality Hid Symptoms, Travel History at 3 Private Hospitals, Exposed Scores to Virus

Ololade Adeyanju/

Details have emerged about how an Assistant Controller of Customs, who was the first person to die from COVID-19 in Oyo State visited three private hospitals in Ibadan, the state capital, while he was already infected.

The deceased, said to be in his early 50s, also sought treatment at the University College Hospital (UCH) where he eventually died yesterday after being initially diagnosed with pneumonia.

NewsmakersNG learnt that the deceased had left his Kano base for Ibadan last Friday, when he started feeling unwell.

While in Ibadan, he reportedly visited at least three private hospitals and two medical diagnostic laboratory, where he failed to disclose the fact that he had just returned from Kano State.

Two of the three private hospitals reportedly managed him for typhoid and malaria.

It was at the third private hospital that a doctor suggested taking his samples for COVID testing.

This was when he admitted, for the first time, that his samples had already been taken by the NCDC and he was only awaiting his result.

It later emerged that his samples were collected for testing on Monday, after which NCDC officials told him to self-isolate.

But the deceased ignored the advice by visiting the third private hospital that same Monday as well as the day after.

It was on Tuesday that he was referred to UCH, after he eventually opened up about his details; including the fact that his samples had been collected for COVID-19 test.

The test result came back positive yesterday, but he had died hours earlier.

0