THE Chairman of Imo State Task Force on COVID-19, Prof, Maurice Iwu has warned that people should not only put on shield but, should wear mask to curb the spread of COVID-19.
Prof. Iwu gave the advise on Tuesday in Owerri shortly after submitting the report of the task force to Imo State Governor, Hope Uzodimma.
According to Iwu, ““I want to say that it is criminal for one not to wear a face mask at this stage.
“It is not very okay to wear only the shield, but you have to combine it with face mask for effectiveness.
“We have ended the first phase of our assignment which dealt mainly on the fight against the virus and preventing it from entering into the state and has handed the report to the governor.
“The second phase is very important, but more dangerous which majors mainly on stopping community transmission of the virus with the involvement of every segment of the society.
“People are yet to come to terms with the existence of COVID-19; they say they are yet to have the identity of people that have it, see them before they could believe, which is a very dangerous position to take.
“This second phase of the fight is critical and calls for people to observe the COVID-19 protocol of hand washing with soap under running water, use of alcohol based sanitiser, social distancing and wearing of face mask.
“My team and I in this second phase, is trying to strategise on how best to stop the virus from spreading. It is a very difficult and a dangerous phase all together in the fight against COVID-19.”
