COVID-19: Nigeria Maintains Slow Progress In Testing As Clinical Trial Of Potential Cure Stalls
Nigeria is witnessing slow progress in testing for Coronavirus. Clinical trials for local solutions to the disease have also stalled.
SaharaReporters analyses some recent efforts made by stakeholders at the forefront of finding local cure for the disease. This includes local experts with cure claims, who are struggling to prevail on government to invest in their research that could potentially put Nigeria in the frontline of the global fight against the virus. Funding has been a major challenge.
So far, Nigeria has done about 10,000 tests despite almost four weeks of lockdown and having labs that can conduct 1,500 tests daily. 
Elsewhere on the continent, the story is different. Tunisia has done 20,818 tests as at Saturday, April 25, Ghana has conducted 100,622 tests as at Saturday, April 25, while South Africa had done 197,127 as at Wednesday, April 29.
As the race to find the vaccine heats up, the Nigerian Government has also stationed itself as part of the audience at the end, waiting for the global Alliance Vaccine Initiative to give out the World Health Organisation approved doses. See Also 
Speaking during a press conference in Lagos on April 8, Minister of Health, Osagie Ehanire, said government was willing to work with serious herbal practitioners for a cure.
He said, “We will look into every assertion. Some people say they have herbs and some others say they have concoctions. Only for those that are serious, the Department of Traditional, Complementary and Alternative Medicine
in the Ministry of Health will look into their claims and we will not throw away from any suggestion.”
Unverified claims
Days before issuing this promise, several persons with some reputation in the moral bank had claimed to possess cure for the virus.
“To cure this disease is through natural elements put together. It has been tested. I have used it and also used it for some of the chronic COVID-19 patients with testimonials,” the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye
Ogunwusi tweeted on March 30.
“I challenge researchers both in Nigeria and the world to make these natural herbs into clinical medicine and extract the vaccines from it. I am ready to work with them and provide huge access to the herbs. It is real and works. I have a lot gathered together for the use of mankind. I'm also currently working with Yem Kem International (Alternative Medicine Expert) pharmaceutical company for the packaging and distribution of these globally. It is about time to save the world. Tomorrow may be too late,” he added. Some 28 days before Ooni’s tweet became a trending story, a former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission,
Maurice Iwu, who is a professor of Pharmacognosy, told the Nigerian Government that he had since 2008 developed three compounds extracted from plants in the country that could work against certain viruses.
“We are considering developing the three products together so they become the first broad-spectrum antiviral agent coming out of Nigeria.
“We want to plead with you to appeal to Nigerians for their support so that we can develop our own medicine and have medicine for Coronavirus instead of waiting and using that from other places,” Iwu said.
Iwu said he signed a ‘non-clinical evaluation agreement’ with the US Government ‘for us to take this product forward'.
He said, “We are trying to see how we can test this compound immediately against this new virus.”
Six days before the minister’s promise, the provost of Luminar International College of Alternative Medicine in Enugu State (an an institution recognised by the Federal Ministry of Health), Prof Joseph Akpa, challenged the government to bring COVID-19 cases to him.
“I will challenge any health institution or agency to bring any known case of Coronavirus to me and see how it will disappear within a few days,” the prof said during a press briefing.
“If the Permanent Secretary of Enugu State Ministry of Health or the state government approaches me to cure any of the known cases of Coronavirus in the state, I will voluntarily do so without attaching any condition to it.”
In November 2019, this institution held a symposium on alternative medicine in Enugu in partnership with the Federal Ministry of Health.
That was not all. Akintunde Ayeni, MD/CEO of YEMKEM International for Alternative Therapy, said in a press conference that he was also working with the National Agency for Food, Drugs and Administration Control to develop a cure for COVID-19 based on the herbs given by Ooni of Ife in a video attached to his March 30 tweet.
This appears to be good news but there are concerns about their practicability. For one, while NAFDAC may have the laboratory capacity to test for the harmfulness of a drug, it does not have the capacity or funding to
carry out clinical trials and determine the curative compounds of these treatments.
Nigerian institutions have developed NAFDAC approved drugs – the Nigerian Institute for Pharmaceutical Research and Development owns the patent for a herbal drug, Nicosan, but there is no funding for sustained
production of existing products and clinical tests for new ones.
The investment
A two-time Vice Chancellor of the Obafemi Awolowo University and professor of Pharmacognosy, Anthony Elujoba, told the International Center for Investigative Reporting that the Federal Government
had, however, sunk in lots of funds into studying alternative medicine.
“Our government has what it takes to try herbal medicine,” he told ICIR. “This is because the government has also committed funds into the study and use of herbal medicine. For example, there is a book we call Pharmacopoeia. The book contains drugs that can be used safely in any country. This government has committed funds to bring it out.”
He said the government even has a constituted committee on herbal medicine made up of orthodox and traditional medical practitioners.
“This same Federal Government has set up a national committee which I am a member. This committee comprises experts, both traditional healers and intellectuals in medicinal plant science and we are recommending medicinal plants for different diseases that can be made official that people can use to compose medicine to finished product level which can be listed by NAFDAC and be used by our people.
“We have met only once; we met for three days and we have come up with beautiful ideas. We spoke to the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health that day and we also deliberated on COVID-19 and how much
herbal medicine can do to reduce a lot of importation. We have gotten several areas of traditional medicine that can be made use of sometimes better than orthodox.”
He also gave credence to the claims of Professor Iwu while acknowledging that there is no laboratory to test medicinal plant extracts directly on viruses.
Elujoba maintained that the Nigerian Government had set up many committees and institutes but added that there will be no gains ‘until a clinical trial has been done in the hospital.’
No data from isolation ventres
The Nigerian Government has also not released any data on its treatment therapy for COVID-19 in isolation centres and hospitals across the country.
The Lagos State Hovernment said on April 6 that it would conduct a clinical trial on Coronavirus cure. It had discharged 117 patients at the time of writing this analysis. The level of wellness of the patients was not disclosed, no detail of the therapy used to manage them has been released to the media.
The Minister of Health quotes therapy from other countries, such as the use of chloroquine, which first emanated from France and the use of Plasma therapy and steroids, whose findings were first published in
South Korea.
What government must do
While Elujoba and Iwu are restrained from carrying out clinical trials on natural cures, their colleagues abroad have been more fortunate.
They have, in many instances, been able to write in medical journals with substantive literature, more effective ways of using natural solutions to deal with infections approved by the industry.
Some experts say with the availability of evidence-based
data on natural solutions within and outside the country, now was the time for
the Federal Government to stop stalling on testing natural solutions, which
according to Elujoba, it has committed funds into.
PUBLIC HEALTH News AddThis : Original Author : SaharaReporters, New York Disable advertisements :
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