The management of the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital (UITH) on Tuesday placed 28 medical staff on self-isolation who had contact with the suspected coronavirus (COVID-19) patient who died last Thursday.
Kwara State recorded two index cases of COVID-19 on Monday following reported contact with the deceased.
The hospital management has already suspended senior consultant, Prof. Alakija Salami, for not disclosing that the deceased had been on self-isolation.
Yusuf said the hospital was working with the Kwara State Government Technical Committee on COVID-19 to trace all who had contact with the deceased.
“Already, all UITH staff with close contact with the deceased patient on the night of his admission, or his corpse have been ordered to proceed on self isolation,” he said.
“Besides, the ‘A and E’ ward and the ambulance used to convey his corpse to Off had been promptly fumigated.
“With all these level of preparedness and precautionary measures, we were taken aback to discover how a very senior consultant of this hospital had facilitated the admission of a suspected case of COVID-19 at the Accident and Emergency section of the hospital on the night of Wednesday, April 1st 2020.
“We were fed with the information of a suspected food poisoning, as the cause of the death of the patient until we got another lead to the likely cause of the death of the said patient. In fact, it was shocking to us that the wife of the deceased patient had tested positive for the deadly virus as announced yesterday by the kwara State Covid-19 Technical committee.
“Without belabouring the narrative that led to the unfortunate incident, I humbly request you to use channels of your various media to help convey the remote and immediate decisions we had taken on the professor who facilitated the admission of the patient.
“The management of the hospital has placed Prof A. K. Salami on immediate suspension as a senior consultant in this hospital bothering on his unethical conduct in the admission, management and eventual release of the corpse of the suspected Covid -19 patient who died in the hospital on the 2nd of April, 2020,” he said.
The CMD added that the institution had set up a committee to investigate the professor’s actions.
The committee will submit its report in one week, he said.
