Lagos governor updates on virus preps, volunteers

With coronavirus cases on the rise in Nigeria, the governor of Lagos is expanding the state's capacity to help patients by increasing the number of treatment beds and encouraging volunteers.

"We have built so much redundancy that it is unimaginable. We certainly can take ten times the number that we have currently," Governor Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu told the Associated Press in an interview.

He spoke as health authorities on Thursday reported 98 positive cases of COVID-19, the illness caused by coronavirus, in Lagos state.

Sanwo-Olu, who is working from home and observing social distancing guidelines, said he did not believe all people in the state should get tested for the new virus.

"To the extent that if you don't feel unwell... there's really no need for us to begin to say to everybody on the street to come and get tested, no," Sanwo-Olu said.

He stressed that authorities were "checking, watching and tracking" across the state to try to identify positive cases and bring the outbreak under control.

For most people, the new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks.

For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia and death.

The vast majority of people recover.

The new coronavirus has caused a global pandemic that has sickened over 1 million, killed at least 53,000 worldwide, crippled economies and forced restrictions on the movement of millions of people in an effort to stop the virus from spreading further and overwhelming health care systems.