Sanwo-Olu says there’s PPE shortage in Lagos
The Governor of Lagos State, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has said there is a shortage of Personal Protective Equipment for health workers in the state.
Sanwo-Olu said this while reacting to a question at a briefing on COVID-19 update on Sunday at the State House in Marina.
He clarified the shortage of PPE in the state is not a “rumour”.
The governor, however, urged suppliers not to take advantage of the current situation by hiking the prices of PPE.
When asked if it was true that Lagos is also witnessing a shortage of PPE, Sanwo-Olu replied, “The shortage of PPE can never be a rumour. If there are no PPEs, there are no PPEs, and the truth about the matter is these are consumables. Even if you buy 10,000, as long as people are using them, as long as people are testing positive, and you’re having a lot more medical personnel on the line, you’ll run short of it.
“You need to help us with to tell a few of our suppliers that this is not the time to profit unnecessarily. These are things that when we started, we bought at N3,000, N4,000, now it’s N15,000, N20,000.
“People are unduly just taking advantage of it and even when you tell them to go and bring, it’s all stories again.”
He, however, said the state was considering the local production of some of the equipment.
“We’re looking inward now, to see if we can develop capacity internally and see if our local tailoring companies can be ingenious enough to also solve it. The conversation is going very well, he added.
