Following her battle with the deadly coronavirus, Nollywood actress, Zainab Balogun, has beckoned on Nigerians to take the virus more seriously.
During a chat with Saturday Beats, she revealed that she knows at least 15 people who died from COVID-19, and that changes her perspective greatly.
She said: “I am familiar with the nonchalant attitude that many people still have about the virus. There are too many talks of it not being real. I want to lend my voice to clarify some of those rumours and encourage people to take the pandemic seriously. I know of at least 15 people who died from COVID-19, and that changes my perspective greatly.
“Unfortunately, people often fail to believe until it hits close to home. COVID-19 is not fake. The number of people dying is not fake. The numbers in the morgue don’t lie. The virus has no preference for rich or poor. It is neither malaria nor a simple cough/cold. We have a responsibility to ourselves and families to be safe and take things seriously. We should not wait for it to get close to home.”
Also sharing her isolation experience, ‘The Wedding Party’ actress noted that she spent Christmas and New Year away from her family. “After testing positive for the virus two days before Christmas, I immediately isolated myself from my family. Thankfully, they all tested negative. It was really a lonely experience without normal interactions. I spent Christmas and New Year away from my family, and that was very hard,” she said.