Oyo State records two new COVID-19 positive cases

• Don says 8.5m Nigerians have hearing impairment
Oyo State government yesterday said that it had recorded another two confirmed coronavirus cases in Ibadan.

It said that one came from iSON Xperiences and the other from Ido Local Council of the state.

The state’s governor, Seyi Makinde, who disclosed this in his Twitter post yesterday, said: “The COVID-19 confirmation tests for two suspected cases came back positive. One case is from iSON Xperiences and the other case is from Ido Local Council. So, the total number of confirmed cases in Oyo State is 252.”

In another development, the President of Speech Pathologists and Audiologists Association in Nigeria (SPAAN), Prof. Julius Ademokoya, has raised the alarm that 8.5 million Nigerians have some form of hearing defects.

Ademokoya, who also noted that Nigeria has less than 300 audiologists to attend to people with hearing issues, urged government to encourage more people to become audiologists.

The don disclosed this yesterday while addressing journalists at the Press Centre, Iyaganku, Ibadan, to commemorate the international month of hearing and speech for 2020.

At the event, organised by SPAAN in collaboration with Smile Train Incorporation, Ademokoya was supported during the press conference by the Vice President of the association, Prof. Oyedunni Arulogun, and a consultant/partner with Smile Train Incorporation, dealing with free surgeries for children suffering from cleft palate, Dr. Adeola Olusanya.

Ademokoya stated that people are daily being exposed to things that could make them lose their hearing functions, which include gunshots, abuse of earpiece and noise pollution, adding that there has not been statistics to show the number of people that have speaking problems.

He suggested that government should come up with legislations that would make every parent take their children to appropriate health facilities for early detection of hearing and speaking problems for treatment before getting out of hand.

He also said that government should set up centres in each local council where people that have hearing and speaking problems could access healthcare instead of travelling to the state capitals to access such healthcare.

He, therefore, emphasised the need for people to protect their auditory system through hearing conservation.