Worried by the number of deaths and disruptions caused by COVID-19 pandemic to lives and workplaces, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) in conjunction with Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) have stoked the consciousness of COVID-19 among Nigerians.
Citing that COVID-19 is still very much around in spite of ignorance by many people as reason for the renewed sensitisation around Ojo community, picking Lagos State University (LASU) Health Centre as base, NLC Lagos State chairman, Comrade Funmi Sessi urged Nigerians to create healthy environment by taking full dosage of preventive vaccines to safeguard families and workplace environments.
According to her, the world of work has been greatly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, adding that though the pandemic created lots of havoc in the past, the damages done to lives and business environment has not been fully swept off.
She said, “With the disruptions caused by the pandemic in places of work and the society at large, it became very necessary for the working people in Nigeria to be mobilised for testing and vaccination against the disease so that workplaces will be freed of COVID-19 and for optimal productivity to be attained.”
Sessi further noted that, “There may be skeptics and skepticism about COVID-19 with some people seeing it as form of disturbance by labour, but the sensitisation and social mobilisation is meant for uptake of COVID-19 testing and vaccination.’’
She noted that aside from sensitisation and mobilising Nigerian workers to go for testing and vaccination, it will provide trade unions with the opportunity to test run their readiness for emergency situations.
In her submission, the facilitator in the programme, Dr C.O Eferaro from LASU warned against taking half dose, noting that COVID-19 main solution is continuous testing and hand washing on regular bases to avoid it.