The Governor of Lagos State, Babatunde Fashola has paid a visit to the First Consultant Medical Center in Obalende where the index Ebola patient in Nigeria, Patrick Sawyer was treated.
Governor Fashola was received at the recently decontaminated facility by the Chief Medical Director, Benjamin Ohiaeri, on Friday, September 19, 2014 and he pledged his support to the hospital.
The governor reportedly said:
โYou need to let us know how we will help and, certainly, we will help. โOne of the ways the state government will be assisting the hospital is to replace all the equipment discarded during the decontamination process.
โThis is the first thing we will be doing to replace the tools, but, most importantly, we will also be supporting the personnel, because they are the most important tools.
โOn law, there is the Public Health Law and you were right to have acted the way you did. We are also considering the amendment to that law.
โAnd when the executive bill goes to the parliament in a couple of weeks, I have asked them to list it for consideration to see what we can do in the law to strengthen capacity going forward.โ
The hospital lost four staff to Ebola, including late Dr. Stella Ameyo Adadevoh who made the call to keep Sawyer confined and Justina Ejelonu, a pregnant 25-year-old nurse who had just started work.
Patrick Sawyer arrived Nigeria with Ebola and died at the First Consultant Medical Center on July 25 making him the first Ebola case and the first death from the disease to be recorded in the country.
