Molecular Diagnosis of COVID-19 in Nigeria: Current Practices, Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract

Nigeria has continued to record a dramatic rise in the number of confirmed cases and fatalities of Coronavirus Diseas-2019 (COVID-19) since the first incidence was reported on the 27th of February, 2020. As of 25 August, 2020; Nigeria has the largest COVID-19 outbreak in the West-Africa sub-region (52,800), second to South-Africa (613,017) in the continent. In the absence of an effective and safe vaccine, accurate diagnosis in a timely fashion is very critical to the control of the pandemic. Diagnostic testing allows tracking of the virus, understanding its epidemiology, informing case management, interrupting and suppressing its transmission. Although several serologic methods are being developed and are currently being validated for the diagnosis of COVID-19, the only authorized testing platform for COVID-19 diagnosis in Nigeria as of now is nucleic acid detection in nasal swab, throat swab or other respiratory tract specimen using the Real time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Unfortunately, the country is not testing just enough due to its low molecular testing capacity. Lack of sufficient testing has been identified as the main reason we are not seeing the true picture of the outbreak in the country. In reality, the cumulative counts of COVID-19 cases may be ten times higher than reported, hence the need to scale-up the national molecular testing capacity amidst scarce resources. This review takes a look at the current practices, challenges and opportunities for molecular diagnosis of COVID-19 in Nigeria.