Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Professor Akin Abayomi, has said that the state government has spent about N800 million on testing 16,000 people for COVID-19.
The Commissioner said this while giving the weekly update on COVID-19 to journalists at the Press Centre in Alausa Secretariat, Ikeja.
Abayomi disclosed that each COVID-19 test cost between N40,000 to N50,000, while 16,000 tests have been conducted in total.
“We have so far performed 16,000 COVID-19 tests in Lagos, which is much higher than anywhere else in Nigeria.
“We are planning to test up to about 1,000 people per day very soon in the next month or two we are going to be ramping up our capacity to test.
“For now the government is providing testing free of charge and the government pays about N40,000 to N50,000 per test.
“But as we ramp up our testing we are going to try and use some means of subsidy for the test, either through insurance or through some contributions from donors or from development partners to help us to subsidize the test.
“For now the state government is providing COVID-19 testing free of charge and all citizens who need to be tested for covid-19 either because they are not feeling well or had a close contact can get it done free of charge at any of our covid-19 testing sites on the four laboratories.”
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