The Eastern Naval Command of the Nigerian Navy on Friday said the Command was carrying out Coronavirus screening for passengers onboard vessels entering Nigeria through the maritime environment.
Flag Officer Commanding, Eastern Naval Command, Rear Adm. David Adeniran, disclosed this to newsmen on Friday in Calabar.
Adeniran said the steps were taken to ensure that no victim from any of the affected countries was allowed entry into the country through the waterways unnoticed.
He said: “At the onset of the pandemic, the Chief of Naval Staff gave an instruction through the medical administration, which we have keyed into on the steps taken to prevent the virus.
“When you enter any unit of Eastern Naval Command, you will see very strict compliance as it concerns screening of your temperature, washing hand basins and sanitisers.
“In terms of entry, whenever we have information that any ship is coming into Nigeria, we keep track of the vessel.
“We have facilities through the falcon eye to track any ship movement for 30 days to know which country or water you have been to and from there we monitor and direct accordingly.
“We as the Navy know how to track any vessel and know the location they are coming from. With that, we are able to advise the port authorities and offshore oil facilities accordingly.”
The FOC explained that the Eastern Naval Command had set up a Coronavirus help centre and other social media groups where everyone in the command is updated.
“For now, there is no reported case of any Coronavirus from the maritime environment.
“From the onset of this pandemic, there was a particular ship that came from one of the affected countries and we took appropriate actions to ensure that the vessel was cleared without any issue of health challenge.
“So far so good, the Navy is ready.
“During the Ebola outbreak, the Navy Reference Hospital in Calabar took appropriate steps and a lot of money was spent by the hospital to ensure that any detected case was handled efficiently,” he said.
He assured of the hospital’s preparedness to handle any case of Coronavirus within the state.
