The NCDC also said that six new patients have been confirmed dead to the virus in the country, bringing the total number of death to 93.
The agency on its confirmed twitter handle on Monday night said that the 245 new cases were recorded from 16 states.
“76-Lagos, 37-Katsina, 32-Jigawa, 23-Kano, 19-FCT, 18-Borno, 10-Edo, 9-Bauchi, 6-Adamawa, 5 each from Oyo, and Ogun, while one each from, Ekiti, Osun, Benue, Niger and Zamfara,” it said .
According to NCDC, as at 11;45 pm, May 4, Nigeria has 2802 Active Cases of COVID-19 and 417 Treated and Discharge in the country.
The Federal Government says it might be forced to implement another lockdown if Nigerians do not comply with social distancing measures.
Dr Chike Ihekweazu, Director General of the NCDC, who stated this at the Presidential Task Force briefing on COVID-19, said businesses must also join hands to implement the required health measures.
Weeks of lockdown in Lagos and Abuja and Ogun states were eased on May 4, but crowds clustered at banks and other public spaces, defying the government’s advisories.
“Initial reports are not too pleasing across the country,” he said of the lockdown compliance.
Ihekweazu noted that the decision of banks to open only a few branches could be counterproductive as people troop to the limited options.
He said: “So, there’s only so much we can do.
“We can produce all the guidelines in the world, we can preach, hold press conferences, but if organisations are not going to support the implementation of these measures and help us manage the risk, how do we want to manage and mitigate the risk of exposure, the risk of transmission?”
The DG said there was no doubt that Monday’s behaviour would result in more infections, but urged the nation to learn from it or return to square one.
“Yes, we knew today would be a problem.
“Everybody here knew today would be a problem, because for the first time people were let out of their homes.
“But now that we have seen the sunlight again, the challenge for us as a society is how do we now organise ourselves to mitigate this risk to limit transmission.
“Yes, we might have a few extra transmission today and tomorrow, but what we don’t want is an explosion of new infections.
“If we do have that new explosion, there would be almost no choice for the leadership of the country than to ask everybody to go back into our homes,” he said.
Also read: Nigeria’s 170 new cases surge COVID-19 infections to 2558
In the meantime, the World Health Organisation (WHO) says the number of reported COVID-19 cases in the WHO African Region has increased to over 44,000.
The WHO Regional Office for Africa in Brazzaville, Congo, gave the update on its official twitter account @WHOAFRO on Monday.
“There are over 44,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases on the African continent – with more than 1,700 associated deaths,” it said.
The figures on the dashboard showed that South Africa, Algeria and Nigeria had the highest reported cases on the list.
It showed that South Africa had 6,783 cases and 131 deaths followed by Algeria with 4,474 cases and 463 deaths, while Nigeria had 2,388 confirmed cases with 85 deaths.
According to the dashboard, Comoros, Mauritania, Seychelles are countries with the lowest confirmed cases in the region.
It showed that Comoros had three confirmed cases with zero death.
Mauritania, the dashboard showed, was the second country with the lowest confirmed cases with eight reported cases and one death.
Seychelles, the third country with the lowest cases, had recorded 11 confirmed cases with zero death.
WHO, however, urged anybody who had been exposed to COVID-19 to self isolate to prevent further spread.
“Stay home in quarantine if you may have been exposed to COVID-19 and prevent further spread of the virus.
“Isolation is important to stop the spread of COVID-19, even if you have minor symptoms such as a cough, headache or mild fever.
“The best way to protect yourself against COVID-19 is to keep at least one metre away from others and to wash your hands frequently and thoroughly,’’ it added.
