The Ogun State government has denied report of monkey pox in the state.
Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC) had listed Ogun as one of the states affected by the disease.
However, the state Commissioner for Health, Babatunde Ipaye, while speaking to journalists in Abeokuta described the report as shocking, insisting that no case of monkey pox had been recorded in the state.
He, however, blamed the report on overzealous official of the state who informed the Federal Ministry of Health when the case has not been properly examined.
According to him, an officer from the state hospital in Ijebu Ode only noticed a skin lesion on a patient at the hospital and reported the case as monkey pox to NCDC
Ipaye said: “It was very surprising as the state commissioner for health and the chief epidemiologist of the state to hear that Ogun State was listed among states with cases of monkey pox.
“We have not recorded any confirmed case of monkey pox in the state, Ogun State doesn’t have a single case.
“Yes, there was an overzealous officer of the ministry who saw somebody with skin lesion in state hospital, Ijebu Ode and unfortunately called the Federal Ministry of Health and incidented suspected case.
“Any patient in the category of that patient that was incidented cannot be considered as a suspected case because the patient has another primary problem that can give rise to skin lesion, that is not a suspected case.
“Further questioning was even very revealing that the skin lesion the patient had was not even pathognomonic of monkey pox, it was not suggestive of monkey pox but more of another skin lesion and the screening negates the entire report itself. “We are not averse to reporting one, if there is a case. We are not willing to cover up a case but we must also not sent people panicking for things that we do not have.”
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