The Abia State Government said that it has re-arrested a fleeing COVID-19 suspect in the state.

The Abia State Commissioner for Information, John Kalu, said the state’s COVID-19 Medical Rapid Response Team got information from the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and promptly responded to it.

He said,

The NCDC said a suspected COVID-19 patient named Vincent Prosper called them from Abia State to report, among other things, that he was manifesting symptoms of the virus and recently had contacts with a confirmed case in neighbouring Akwa Ibom State in addition to recently returning from Lagos State.

Our team immediately swung into action and called the number forwarded, took notes and asked the individual to isolate himself pending our arrival to take samples for testing.

However, on arrival at the given location, the suspect disappeared. He later confessed that he saw the ambulance and the fully-kitted RR-team, lost courage, detested the possibility of being locked down and decided to switch off his phone and disappear into thin air.

We continued to look for him quietly and at some point, got him again on the telephone and he gave us a wrong address on Azikiwe Road and a team was immediately dispatched to the location but did not find him there.

The commissioner, also a member of the state committee on coronavirus disease, said the Rapid Response Team enlisted the services of a top security agency in Abia State to quickly locate him and also alerted members of the public regarding the situation, with the hope that he would voluntarily surrender.

He never did! But late last night, the security agency pinned his location down and this morning our RR-team stormed the location with security agents and took him into custody at our isolation facility in Amachara where we have now collected samples from him and dispatched it to the NCDC for testing.

He is now cooperating fully and all necessary information given, including the fact that while he actually recently returned from Lagos he did not visit Akwa Ibom State since his return though he resides in a border community to Akwa Ibom State. His real name is not Vincent Prosper and he actually made the call to the NCDC control room.

The state government had on Friday, via a Public Service Announcement, alerted residents about the fleeing COVID-19 suspect.

Justin Nwosu

Justin Nwosu is the founder and publisher of Flavision. His core interest is in writing unbiased news about Nigeria in particular and Africa in general. He’s a strong adherent of investigative journalism, with a bent on exposing corruption, abuse of power and societal ills.