COVID-19: Chaos As Heritage Bank Workers Develop COVID-19 Symptoms, One Die

Chaos, fear and anxiety are currently rocking Heritage bank following two suspected coronavirus cases within a space of months. The new suspected coronavirus case was at Heritage Bank branch located at Allen, Ikeja, Lagos, after one of the employees developed COVID-19 symptoms, leading to fear among workers that could have come in contact with the worker during work hours.

The suspected case of COVID-19 was detected last week after the unnamed worker began to show signs of the symptoms. Throughout this week and last week, the staff of the Allen branch were told to stay back at home, while they were asked if they had come in contact with the worker in order to isolate themselves.

The worker that developed the symptoms was tested to know the status. The bank had been operating a one week on and one week off after coronavirus spread into Nigeria. Presently, there are 27,110 confirmed coronavirus cases in Nigeria.

AllNews efforts to reach Heritage Bank proved abortive, as the lender didn't respond to an enquiry sent to the company's official mail. A staff reached via phone call declined to comment officially though he said that that the test results of the personnel tested returned negative and the Allen branch will reopen on Monday. 

Also, calls and messages to the Head of Media and External Relations of Heritage Bank, Blaise Udunze, went unanswered. AllNews gathered from a source that the workers are still at home isolating, but customers - who visited the Heritage Bank branch where the suspected case was recorded last week - haven't been informed publicly.

Is Heritage Bank Hiding Anything?

Heritage Bank hasn't made the incident at its Allen branch public. This Is not the first time a worker at the bank developed COVID-19 symptoms. The lender had also recorded a suspected case of COVID-19 in its Headquarters, Lekki, Lagos, about a month ago - just like it had kept the Allen incident under wraps, the headquarters incident was also not made public.

Note that most banks haven't reopened their branches since the lockdown was eased on May 4, 2020, so the shutdown of the branches that recorded COVID-19 could be camouflaged as a new normal routine of banks not opening all their branches to the public.

The bank had also shut down its headquarters after the worker developed COVID-19 symptoms. Workers at the headquarters were told to stay back at home. The Heritage Bank staff who was suspected to have COVID-19 later died. Note that the number of COVID-19 related death in Nigeria is 616 according to the Nigerian Center for Disease Control (NCDC).