Showing posts with label Health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Health. Show all posts

Monday, March 18, 2024

Video - Nigeria government bans leave of absence for health workers



The Nigerian government has banned health professionals from taking leave of absence as it tries to stop them taking jobs abroad while on leave. Many health workers in Nigeria have been taking the extended leave to secure jobs abroad and abandoning their posts at home without formally resigning.

CGTN

Related stories: Over 10,000 doctors left Nigeria for UK in last 7 yrs

Nigeria suffering from medical brain drain

 

 

Video - Increased charcoal usage raises pollution and health concerns in Nigeria



In Nigeria, the demand for charcoal is up. While that's good news for charcoal producers, others worry about the charcoal industry's impact on the environment. They want the government to prioritize the supply of liquified petroleum gas to Nigerian households to help curb the destructive environmental and health effects of the charcoal trade.

CGTN

Related story: COP28 'Transition Away' From Fossil Fuels deal brings Mixed Reaction in Nigeria

 

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Video - Nigeria collaborates with the UN to combat HIV/AIDS stigma



Despite significant progress in reducing HIV/AIDS infections and related deaths, stigma persists, particularly in workplace environments, according to UN-AIDS. Nigeria aims to further address this issue through collaboration with the United Nations.

CGTN

Related stories: Nigeria vows to end HIV scourge by 2030

Nigeria will start producing anti-retroviral drugs

 

 

Thursday, February 29, 2024

Meningitis outbreak kills 20 students in northern Nigeria

A meningitis outbreak has killed 20 students in northern Nigeria, local media reported Wednesday (Feb. 28).

The death toll which remains provisional was announced by the Yobe state Education commissioner.

The outbreak has been recorded in some secondary schools in the state.

Over a hundred cases have allegedly been reported with three patients said to still be in an intensive care unit responding to treatment.

Meningitis is an infection which causes an acute inflammation of the outer layers of the brain and spinal cord. It can be life-threatening unless diagnosed and treated early.

Transmission is through direct person-to-person contact, including droplets from the nose and throat of infected people.

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention shared Wednesday (Feb. 28) on its X account (formerly twitter) a meningitis vigilance map.

Indeed, weather conditions can favour prevalence of meningitis.

Most of cases in the country are reported across states in the northern region.

According to the WHO, the west African nation reported 124 deaths from meningitis between 1 October 2022 and 16 April 2023.

African News 

Related stories: Video - Meningitis kills 269 people in Nigeria

Death toll in meningitis outbreak in Nigeria reaches 813

 

Thursday, February 22, 2024

Nigeria records 411 cases of Lassa fever and 72 deaths in six weeks

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has said Nigeria recorded 411 confirmed cases and 72 deaths from Lassa fever across 21 states of the federation from week one to week six of 2024.

The NCDC in its latest situation report for week six spanning 5 to 11 February, revealed that the number of new confirmed cases increased from 70 in week 5 to 83, with nine deaths in the reporting week.

According to the situation report, 65 per cent of all the confirmed cases were from Ondo, Edo, and Bauchi while 35 per cent were reported from 17 states.

The report noted that the number of suspected cases in 2024 (2,122) decreased when compared to that reported for the same period in 2023 (8280).

According to the disease control centre, the predominant age group affected by Lassa fever is 21-30 years, and two new health workers were affected in the reporting week.

NCDC added that the National Lassa fever multi-partner, multi-sectoral Incident Management System has been activated to coordinate response at all levels at the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC).

The agency also enumerated some of the challenges in its fight against Lassa fever across the country, listing; late presentation of the cases leading to an increase in CFR, and poor health-seeking behaviour due to the high cost of treatment and clinical management.

Other challenges are poor environmental sanitation conditions and poor awareness reportedly observed in high-burden communities.
Lassa fever

Lassa fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic (excessive bleeding) illness that is transmitted to humans through contact with food or household items contaminated by infected rodents or contaminated persons.

Its symptoms include fever, headache, sore throat, general body weakness, cough, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, muscle pains, chest pain, and in severe cases, unexplainable bleeding from ears, eyes, nose, mouth, and other body openings.

By Leshi James, Premium Times

Related stories: The deadly virus Nigerians fear more than COVID-19: Lassa fever

Nigerian genome team contained Lassa fever outbreak with international assistance

Tuesday, February 6, 2024

Ending Female Genital Mutilation in Nigeria

“In my clan, they do it in infancy; some others do it in adulthood. My mother was even cut off when she was about to get married. I was cut when I was just five years old, so I didn't know much about it" said now-26-year-old Miss Uzodimma Lucy Ogodo, the Executive Director of Tomorrow, is a Girl Initiative, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in Abakaliki, Ebonyi State.


"I am a survivor of female genital mutilation (FGM). In my community, Abakaliki, FGM is a common practice. Young girls and women are brainwashed into accepting it as our culture. I first learned about it when I was in sixth grade. I asked my mother to explain what it was about. I asked whether I was cut since I can't remember how much it hurt, the implications to my health, the psychological effect of knowing that an essential part of me was brutally chopped off, and the other harmful effects," Uzodinma explained.

"Upon further inquiry, my mom said that I was cut out of ignorance; on their own part, she and my father realised it was wrong to have cut me," Uzodinmma continued, her expression betraying her self-assured manner. As a result, my other siblings were not cut, “no girl or woman deserves to be cut; it simply destroys our spirit."

"My NGO, Tomorrow is Girl Initiative, was founded in a bid to advocate for an end to FGM practice, and it was in my quest for deeper understanding that I became emotionally invested in the cause. Growing up, I was deeply troubled by the fact that no woman deserves to be cut, knowing the dangers involved," she explained.

Every year, millions of girls and women around the world are at risk of undergoing FGM, with Nigeria contributing to 15% of the total population, globally. Female genital mutilation (FGM) is a harmful practice that specifically alters or damages the female genital organs for nonmedical reasons. Although the practices that uphold female genital mutilation (FGM) differ from one culture to another, the operation is typically performed between the ages of infancy and adulthood, and it is well-documented that it has health, social, economic, emotional, and sexual complications.

From what I observed, the system-transformative strategy that called for our collaboration with boys men, and women, traditional rulers and priests, was quite effective. Therefore, I propose that we employ that strategy more frequently. 

In a similar tone, 51-year-old Mrs. Josephine Ezaka, from Amudo, in the Ezza South local government area of Ebonyi State, said she knew about FGM as a child. “It was my grandmother who took me to where I was cut. It was very painful. After the cutting, they use hot water to wash the cut part. As you can imagine, it's very painful. I was like six years old then. I didn't know the implications of the FGM.”.

“Since I got married, I realised that I don't have the urge for sex, as other women used to tell me how sweet it is. My husband has even complained to some people." Josephine Said.

Through joint support from UNICEF, UNFPA, and the government, FGM is no longer practiced in Amudo. Josephine acknowledged the significant role played by UNICEF and UNFPA interventions, coupled with high enlightenment facilitated by the involvement of the church and traditional rulers.

Expressing her commitment, Josephine affirmed, "I did not subject any of my children to FGM. We are actively combating the practice, actively seeking those rumored to use Vaseline powder for cutting. The proven dangers of FGM emphasize the urgency of preventing daughters from undergoing it, as evidenced by numerous cases of women dying during childbirth due to FGM."

“There's a popular story of a woman, though late, who had no opening but a little opening for her to urinate just because of a dangerous vaginal cut in the name of FGM. She died without having a child." Josephine said it sadly.

By Ijeoma Onuoha-Ogwe, UNICEF

Related stories: Calls for law against female genital mutilation to be introduced in Nigeria

Pregnant woman flees Nigeria to Canada to save unborn children from female genital mutilation

Friday, January 19, 2024

Video - Expectant mothers in Nigeria turning to home births amid high cost of maternal Care



Expectant mothers in Nigeria are increasingly choosing home births due to the high cost of maternal care. Some are also opting for traditional birthing methods.

CGTN

Related stories: Video - Nigeria skilled labor force leaving to other countries

Over 10,000 doctors left Nigeria for UK in last 7 yrs

 

 

Thursday, January 11, 2024

Video - Nigeria battles lassa fever outbreak



Nigeria is dealing with an outbreak of lassa fever, an illness caused by consuming food contaminated by rats.The government says the country recorded more than 1,200 cases and 219 deaths from lassa fever in 2023 only.

CGTN

Related stories: Diphtheria outbreak kills 600 in Nigeria

Over 4,000 suspected lassa fever infections recorded in Nigeria this year

 

 

Thursday, November 30, 2023

GSK pull-out from Nigeria causes medication shortage

Asthma sufferers among those rationing drugs amid shortages and high prices after the pharmaceutical company ceased business in Nigeria this year.

Salamat Olashile takes a tablet from a white-and-green sachet. Five minutes later, her breathing is still laboured. “It will soon come down,” she says. She used to have an inhaler, which would have eased her asthma attack faster, but prices have increased dramatically since GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) “exited” the country. She is now reliant on a slower-working tablet called Araminol.

GlaxoSmithKline Nigeria, the country’s subsidiary of the British pharmaceutical firm, first announced in June that Nigeria’s economic problems and foreign currency crisis were severely affecting its work. In August, it said that it would be shutting down operations.

A GSK Global spokesperson said the company was not exiting, but pivoting to a “third-party distributorship”, which it is still processing. “In common with many companies operating in Nigeria, the significant challenge in accessing foreign currency in recent years impacted our local operations and has affected our ability to maintain consistent supply of medicines and vaccines in the market,” the spokesperson said.

Nigerians are now familiar with the resulting shortage of medications – and a spike in cost for inhalers such as Ventolin and Seretide Diskus, antibiotics such as Amoxil, as well as allergy relief drugs, an antimalarial drug and even over-the-counter painkiller, Panadol.

“I’ve been using Ventolin inhalers for eight years now,” says Jalaalah Shittu, a university student first diagnosed with asthma in 2015. “With Ventolin, there’s a hope I can still live a normal life. It provides an almost immediate relief.” But that relief has proved difficult for patients like Olashile and Shittu to replicate with other drugs.

Last week, Olashile’s father went out to get her Ventolin inhaler and came back with Araminol tablets. After a week of her asthma getting worse, he found an inhaler for 9,000 naira (£9), almost four times its usual price.

Olashile says: “My symptoms were worse because of the harmattan – a season characterised by harsh dusty winds and low humidity.” She has stopped going out and is trying to preserve the Ventolin for emergencies.

Shittu, meanwhile, is suffering unpleasant side-effects from alternative drugs. “I start to feel very weak and have a faster heartbeat and shaky body until the drug wears off, and that can take hours,” she says.

Oluwakemi Ebire of Famasi Africa, a digital health platform, says the situation is forcing people to ration medications of all kinds. “The ripple effect of these circumstances on patients is deeply concerning. For those without access to the right information, financial constraints can push them towards counterfeit medication, risking drug-adverse effects, drug resistance, treatment failure and even death.”

Nigeria has an estimated 13 million asthma sufferers, one of the highest rates in Africa. Ebire says: “I spearhead the care and management of chronic patients who depend on these medications for the rest of their lives, and I can tell you that these past few months have been very difficult for our patients, both financially and emotionally.”

In October, Famasi Africa registered a 15% drop in medication adherence rate among diabetic patients under its care, accompanied by a 10% increase in blood sugar levels.

The spokesperson for GSK said none of the medications supplied by the company is considered to be medically critical, and all have generic alternatives. It hoped that new third-party distribution plans could mean some drugs returning to the market early next year. 

By Olatunji Olaigbe, The Guardian

Friday, November 17, 2023

Nigeria declares state of emergency in health sector

The Federal Government has declared a state of emergency in Nigeria’s health sector.

This was as stakeholders across the sector converged in Ekiti State for the 64th National Council on Health where salient issues around the health sector are up for discussion.
Muhammed Ali Pate, the coordinating Minister for Health and Social Welfare said the nation’s health facilities are in bad shape, adding that there is a need for an urgent intervention.

The House of Representatives had last month called on the federal government to declare a state of emergency in the sector and allocate significant votes to it in the 2024 budget.

The call was a sequel to a motion by a Lagos lawmaker Fayinka Oluwatoyin (APC) during a plenary session in Abuja.

In the motion captioned “Need for the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency to collaborate with relevant health agencies in states and local governments to ensure the functionality of Primary Healthcare Centres,” the lawmaker representing Mushin Federal Constituency II of Lagos State said Nigeria’s health facilities are dilapidating at a fast rate.

Read also: FG urged to deepen public private partnership in health sector

According to him, the shortage of personnel, medical equipment, drugs, and qualified personnel among others, has led to a hike in the death toll in health facilities in the country.

By Temitayo Ayetoto-Oladehinde, Business Day

Tuesday, October 24, 2023

State negligence leads to exodus of Nigerian doctors

Lagos, Nigeria — At about 7pm on August 1, when Vwaere Daiso exited her room on the ninth floor of the 10-storey residence for doctors at the Lagos hospital where she worked to retrieve a parcel from the ground floor, she had no idea it was the last time she would do so.

Moments later, she crashed to the floor together with the lift which had become unhinged.

No help came until after 40 minutes of frantic calls for a rescue team by the facility manager and Daiso’s roommate, who sprinted several flights of stairs to call him. The machines in the emergency section were not working either when she was taken there, so she was pronounced dead just as resuscitation began at about 8:59pm.

The 26-year-old’s death and the state of the facilities in the state-run establishment have angered many of her peers, including Joy Aifuobhokhan, one of the first responders at the scene.

“With all due respect, I feel like that [the late treatment] was medicine after death,” Aifuobhokhan, who was stuck in the same lift last year for hours, told Al Jazeera. “Imagine all of that was in place when Vwaere was first brought in within the first five minutes.”

The struggles of Nigeria’s healthcare system are well-documented and have affected the quality and number of doctors available locally, for decades.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), at least 2,000 Nigerian doctors emigrate yearly to hotspots like the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. Since 2019, Nigerian newspapers have been reporting about recruitment exercises conducted by Saudi officials in Lagos and Abuja.

The average salary for a Nigerian doctor in the employ of the federal government, is 240,000 naira ($312.92) monthly, a fraction of the 2,448 ($2,967.20) average remuneration for their peers in the UK. Those employed by the state governments earn even less.

And that has been a key factor in their migration.

But doctors say fleeing Nigeria is also a matter of life and death even for them due to deplorable working conditions and poor equipment as they work round the clock.

On September 17, a doctor at the Lagos State Teaching Hospital died after working nonstop for 72 hours.
 

‘A vicious cycle’

After Daiso’s death, the Lagos state government fired the hospital facility manager and suspended the head of the agency responsible for maintaining the lift. The police also arrested three people.

The incident highlights the state of the health system, according to Dr Fejiro Chinye-Nwoko, general manager at the Nigerian Solidarity Support Fund, a Lagos-based NGO fundraising for medical interventions.

“A strong health system needs to be able to forecast, plan, and respond adequately to health emergencies,” she said.

Only about 72,000 doctors are registered with the Nigerian Medical Association even though approximately 3,000 doctors graduate from Nigeria’s medical schools yearly.

Worse still, only about 35,000 practise in Nigeria, a country of 200 million people, a ratio of one doctor to 10,000 people. This is far below the WHO’s recommended doctor-to-patient ratio of one doctor to 500 people.

This is compounded by a steady decline in the number of nurses, 75,000 of whom have left the country in the last five years.

Routine strikes for better wages and working conditions by available medical personnel have also led to patients now waiting long hours in hospitals to see a doctor. Some have died waiting, especially in areas of conflict in the country’s north.

Doctors often have to innovate on the go, sometimes using cartons as makeshift incubators or conducting critical surgeries by candlelight.

According to Dr Orji Innocent, president of the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD), doctors now die on a weekly basis due to increased stress and unfavourable working conditions. The association is compiling data on deaths to release soon as a report, NARD told Al Jazeera.

“We have entered a vicious cycle because the few doctors that are left are overworked. Many of them feel that they cannot cope and they will pack their bags and leave the system,” he said. “We believe that with what we are seeing, it will be a matter of weeks before there will be a total collapse of the healthcare system in this country.”

“When you check the surgery booking note, you see people are already booked till July next year. And these are cases that shouldn’t take more than a month for the patient to go under surgery,” Innocent added.
Waning interest

Besides going to practise abroad, many medical personnel are now leaving their jobs in pursuit of less strenuous work elsewhere.

Ayomide Ogunrinde, a trained doctor, told Al Jazeera that she endured sexual harassment from superiors while working at a government hospital and then depression from seeing people die “avoidable deaths”.

“The way the hospitals work is that you have to buy the things you need down to the littlest things like cotton wool and that makes work very ineffective. No one would assume that in a public hospital, patients wouldn’t have to be buying plaster,” the 25-year-old said.

Ogunrinde said she sometimes worked 72-hour shifts, attending to patients despite being tired and running the risk of making costly mistakes. Last year, she quit her job and now works as an administrator at a Lagos-based hospitality firm.

Experts say doctors need to be in optimum physical, mental, and psychological state to be able to save lives, but an increased workload and lack of an enabling environment have made that difficult.

“Nigeria has never had an adequate number of doctors, and the recent challenge of brain drain has further worsened the situation,” said Professor Tanimola Akande, a consultant community health physician at the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital. “This will certainly worsen our already bad health indices. Patients’ patronage of quacks and other unreliable places has increased.”

To discourage doctors from fleeing the country, a member of parliament recently proposed that newly inducted doctors practise for a mandatory period of five years in Nigeria to get a licence.

Critics of the government say this will be ineffectual. Instead, they want to see more political will from the government, to ameliorate the situation.

An upgrade of existing facilities and introduction of competitive benefits will boost job satisfaction for medical personnel, said Chinye-Nwoko.

“Prioritising safety by maintaining equipment, and implementing safety protocols is vital to prevent accidents and promote a safer work environment. By taking these steps, the government can help keep doctors in the country … and improve healthcare for all citizens, especially those who are most vulnerable,” she said.

In Lagos, Aifuobhokhan joined other doctors to observe a candle procession in honour of their colleague, days after her passing. She too is leaving her job, to avoid deja vu.

“Now I know for sure I do not want to practise,” she told Al Jazeera. “I don’t want to be in the four walls of any hospital saving lives and then dying where I am saving lives.”

Al Jazeera

Related stories: Over 10,000 doctors left Nigeria for UK in last 7 yrs

How Nigeria can stop doctors’ brain drain – NMA chairman

Thursday, October 12, 2023

Diphtheria outbreak kills 600 in Nigeria

More than 600 people, mostly children, have died of diphtheria in Nigeria since the current outbreak began in December 2022, officials say.

With 14,000 suspected cases, this outbreak is far worse than the last one in 2011 when 98 cases were reported.

Kano state, in northern Nigeria, is the epicentre, recording more than 500 deaths, but there has been a recent decline in active cases.

Diphtheria is highly contagious and affects the nose and throat.

It can also cause ulcers on the skin.

It is spread by coughs and sneezes or through close contact with someone who is infected, and in serious cases can be fatal.

It is preventable through vaccines, but many of the children who have died in Nigeria were unvaccinated, said Dr Faisal Shuaib, the head of the National Primary Health Care Development Agency.

During a visit to a diphtheria isolation centre in Kano city on Wednesday, he added: "Witnessing the young children suffering from this entirely preventable disease at the centre today was profoundly heart-wrenching".

The death toll has risen since 24 September, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) reported 453 fatalities, and 11,587 suspected cases.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said the fatality and infection rate may be higher due to low testing and the failure by some patients to report their symptoms.

But Dr Shuaib said that measures, including contact tracing, have contributed to a decline in the number of cases.

The outbreak has hit 19 of Nigeria's 36 states as well as the federal capital, Abuja.

The worst-affected states are all in the north - Kano, Yobe, Katsina, Borno, Jigawa and Kaduna.

Health authorities are rallying parents with unvaccinated or partly vaccinated children to get them immunised, insisting that immunisation is the most powerful way of controlling the ongoing outbreak.

The WHO said that only 57% of Nigerians are immunised with the pentavalent vaccine, which protects against five life-threatening diseases, including diphtheria.

Nigeria must increase vaccinations to cover at least 80% of the population to prevent future diphtheria outbreaks, it added.

The last major outbreak in the country was in 2011, when 21 people died and 98 were infected in Borno state, the WHO said.

By Gloria Aradi, BBC

Related story: Video - Nigeria confirms diphtheria outbreak

Wednesday, September 13, 2023

Deaths caused by Malaria drops by 55% in Nigeria

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has applauded Nigeria‘s effort in fighting malaria, saying malaria deaths fell by 55 percent from 2.1 per 1000 population to 0.9 per 1000 population.

WHO regional director for Africa, Dr Moeti Moshido, stated this at the launch of the 2022 Nigeria Malaria Report in Abuja.

She said “While Nigeria accounts for around 27 percent of the global burden of malaria cases, the country has seen major progress. Malaria incidence has fallen by 26 percent since 2000 from 413 per 1000 to 302 per 1000 in 2021. Malaria deaths also fell by 55 percent, from 2.1 per 1000 population to 0.9 per 1000 population.”

Moeti identified the drivers of this continuing disease burden as the size of Nigeria’s population, which she said is making scaling up intervention challenging.

Speaking further, he said learning from COVID-19, continuity of provision of essential health services is critical to interventions in malaria and other diseases, particularly in populations affected by humanitarian emergencies, adding that changing environmental factors, such as climate change, and farming and mining practices that may increase transmission.

She said addressing the prevention, elimination, and control of malaria and the burden from other diseases requires critical data and information gathering for evidence-based investment and decision-making.

The Report on malaria in Nigeria 2022 is an excellent model from which to use data to prioritise health interventions. Using data, we can prioritise and target interventions, optimise allocation of resources and facilitate the monitoring of performance at federal and state levels. This report is a result of the collaboration between the Nigeria Malaria Elimination Programme, the WHO Regional Office for Africa, and the Global Malaria Programme.

The report provides critical information on the status of malaria in each of the 36 States and the Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria, making it unique in providing data at the State level to guide a truly subnational response to malaria, providing an overview of the malaria situation across all States, focusing on population demographics, malaria interventions, climate, and disease burden.

Going forward, the Regional Office must support the generation of the data and evidence required to develop similar reports on other diseases and conditions. This will enable countries to monitor interventions at national and sub-national level, to tailor the use of funds by donors and government in the control of communicable and non-communicable diseases.” 

By Patience Ivie Ihejirika, Leadership

Wednesday, August 16, 2023

Medical tourism spending by Nigerians rises by over 40 percent



Nigerians spent at least 1 million U.S. dollars on medical tourism in the first few months of 2023. Medical experts attribute the increase to the mass exodus of medical personnel abroad and poor healthcare systems at home. Those experts say Nigeria's government needs to increase its spending on the health sector to encourage more people to get treatment in the country.

CGTN

Wednesday, July 12, 2023

New malaria vaccine offers some hope to Nigeria

On April 17, 2023, Nigeria approved a promising new malaria vaccine. It's called R21, and in early trials, up to 80% of kids who were vaccinated did not develop malaria.

Nigeria is a country in need of protection from malaria. Its death toll from the disease makes up nearly a third of the world's 619,000 malaria deaths a year.

But in my view, there's a big stumbling block: Many of the people who need the vaccine the most live in poor and rural areas where malaria is troublesome because living conditions that favor mosquito breeding – for example, low quality housing with broken window nets that mosquitoes can easily infiltrate, standing pools of water in gutters, and the proximity to swamps. But they'll likely not be able to get it. The reason is simple — Nigeria doesn't have the kind of health-care network that makes it easy for people in remote areas to see a health professional.

This isn't the first vaccine to ward off malaria. There is one already in widespread use called the RTS,S vaccine, which reduces chances of developing malaria in a vaccinated population by up to 44%. But the R21 vaccine, which works by inducing high levels of malaria-specific antibodies that help to protect against malaria, has shown to be safe and more effective than the RTS,S vaccine in preliminary results from a 2-year long trial.

In early trials conducted in 2019 and 2020, children aged 5 to 17 months were given three doses before malaria season and a booster 12 months later. Up to 80% of children vaccinated did not develop clinical malaria during the 2-year period of the trial.

This testing on kids is crucial – they are the most vulnerable to dying from malaria. In Nigeria, more than 95,000 children under age 5 die from malaria every year.

Serum Institute of India, the license holder of the R21 vaccine, has expressed commitment to manufacture more than 200 million doses annually. This is important because GSK, the manufacturers of the RTS,S vaccine only committed to producing 15 million doses annually through 2028, due to limited manufacturing capacity and low funding, falling far behind the current need of the vaccine which WHO estimates to range from about 80-100 million doses annually.

While WHO hasn't yet authorized the R21 vaccine because they are awaiting further data from the latest completed trial phase 3, they hope to act quickly when more data are in. In a statement, they said "the R21 vaccine, if approved, could help close the sizable gap between supply and demand and further reduce child illness and death from malaria."

So even though the R21 vaccine is still undergoing larger-scale human trials, Nigeria has joined Ghana in authorizing it because of its promise to be the most effective in preventing malaria and its potential to be manufactured at large scale due to its low cost of just $3 a dose. This provisional approval allows a phase 4 trial to be carried out in Nigeria and also places Nigeria among the first countries who will receive the vaccines at large scale.

But what good is a miracle vaccine if those who need it the most can't get it?

The Nigerian government typically rolls out vaccines through its 30,000 primary health centers, but only 20% out of them are functional. This means that most of the primary health centers in Nigeria lack the capacity to provide essential health-care services, because of poor staffing, inadequate equipment, poor distribution of health workers, poor quality of health-care services, poor condition of infrastructure, and lack of essential drug supply.

And according to data from Nigerian researchers, 78% of primary health-care centers in Nigeria serve upward of 20,000 people within a 30-mile-plus radius. For those who live a great distance, options to get to a center are limited. In a country where most people live on less than $1 a day, they likely do not own a private car or have access to/can afford bus options. That means many parents may need to walk as far as 30 miles to receive a vaccine and wait long hours to be seen in the often crowded centers – and they will need to make that trip four times over the course of 18 months.

Indeed, "long travel times" was listed by one study in Nigeria as one of the most frequent reasons deterring parents from getting routine immunizations for their children. Another reason was long queues at health centers.

And those obstacles take a toll on vaccination rates. "About 9 in every 10 children who lived in the mostly economically disadvantaged communities and states were not fully immunized," according to another Nigerian study that surveyed 5,754 children between ages 12–23 months. "Children of mothers who experience difficulty in reaching health facilities are more likely to be incompletely immunized," the report notes. "Difficulty in getting to health facilities serves as a major barrier to child immunization uptake. This is typical of those living in remote areas."

The obvious fix is one that will not happen overnight: Public health authorities must make a financial commitment, however costly, to set up new primary health-care centers throughout the country to dramatically reduce travel time to and wait times at health centers.

In the meantime, global health authorities need to make it easier for people to get to the health-care centers that already exist. One stopgap solution is to provide transport vouchers for those in the cities, so that people are able to travel for free using bus services that run on a regular basis to the nearest health center.

The other is to bring the health-care center to the families in remote villages through public-private partnerships to set up vaccine administration centers at pharmacies, local markets or schools and churches.

As the founder of a free health clinic in Lagos, Nigeria, funded by the Samuel Huntington Foundation, we partnered with a church in an impoverished neighborhood, transforming a space into a small-scale free clinic run by a lead nurse. We've been able to provide primary care to over 2,000 patients. This model places primary health services in proximity to the poor and saves on the cost and time of building a new facility.

This partnership model could be replicated rapidly by public health authorities on a larger scale to ensure the vaccines reach the most vulnerable children in Nigeria. This is what the United States did with its Federal Retail Pharmacy Program, which allowed 300 million more COVID-19 vaccines to reach people through their local pharmacies.

The United States government and the Global Fund have been leading funders of global malaria eradication efforts in the last two decades. They have spent more than $20 billion on important global malaria eradication programs like insecticide bed nets and vaccines. But funding urgently needs to be expanded to go toward building a primary health-care system in Nigeria and other countries with similar circumstances – one that might deliver breakthrough vaccines like R21.

"Everything in Nigeria isn't easy," says Sunday Aromolayan, a bricklayer living in Berger, a city at the border of Lagos and Ogun State, Nigeria. "I have a 2-year-old and a 6-year-old, and for past immunizations, we've had to queue at the hospital for 4 hours, sometimes 5 hours. My schedule has prevented me from going to take immunizations many times. If the malaria vaccine is available, of course, I'd want to get it for my child." 

By Tolani Yesufu, NPR

Related stories: FG taking steps to end Nigeria’s reign as top malaria hob

Video - Nigeria accounts for 31% of global malaria deaths

Regulators in Nigeria Grant Approval to Oxford's Malaria Vaccine

Monday, July 10, 2023

Video - Nigeria confirms diphtheria outbreak



The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) confirmed 798 cases of diphtheria in Nigeria since December 2022.

CGTN

Monday, July 3, 2023

Nigerians warned against eating Ponmo due to Anthrax outbreak



Following an outbreak of anthrax disease in the West African nation of Ghana, Nigerian authorities have urged citizens to halt consumption of cooked animal hides, a delicacy also known as “ponmo” in the country. Gibson Emeka has this story from Abuja, Nigeria, narrated by Salem Solomon.

By Gibson Emeka

Related stories: Video - Government of Nigeria says cow skin or "ponmo" should be worn, not eaten

Video - Nigeria’s ponmo cuisine under threat as the leather sector seeks growth

Nigeria to ban consumption of cow skin ‘ponmo’ for lacking nutritional value

 

 

Tuesday, June 27, 2023

Video - 5,000kg of cannabis seized in Lagos



June 26 is the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. The day was created to strengthen action and cooperation in achieving a world free of drug abuse with this year's theme focused on stopping stigma and discrimination.

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2,998 nurses leave Nigeria for UK

The International Council of Nurses (ICN) has deplored poaching of professionals by rich nations such as the United Kingdom (UK) from poor countries, saying the development was becoming “out of control.”

The submission comes as Nigeria lost 2,998 trained nurses in 2021-2022 to British National Health Service (NHS).

ICN’s Chief Executive, Howard Catton, told the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC): “My sense is that the situation currently is out of control.

“We have intense recruitment taking place mainly driven by six or seven high-income countries but with recruitment from countries which are some of the weakest and most vulnerable which can ill-afford to lose their nurses.”

According to a report first published by Daily Mail UK, the ICN said six or seven high-income countries are driving “intense recruitment” from places that “can ill-afford to lose their nurses.”

India and the Philippines account for the lion’s share of recruits for the period under review. But a fifth came from ‘red listed’ countries, where the NHS is banned from actively poaching nurses. They were Nigeria, Ghana, Nepal and Pakistan.

The data, from the UK’s Nursing and Midwifery Council, cover the period before Britain struck a special deal with Nepal to allow the NHS to recruit nurses from the country.

Ghana is one of the worst hit, with hospitals warning that their workforce had been slashed as staff rushed to fill NHS posts they found on social media.

Statistics from NHS England, which have 112,000 vacancies, suggest that approximately two-thirds of the increase in staff hired since 2019 were trained abroad.

Latest NHS, England data show that the service is recruiting more nurses abroad than ever before, with 44,000 joining the organisation since 2019, compared to the 22,000UK-trained attendants.

Most recruits were from India, the Philippines, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and Ghana.
IN a related development, The British government has committed £2 million to strengthen Nigeria’s health workforce.

British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Dr. Richard Montgomery, who disclosed this in a statement yesterday, noted that the Nigerian health system, like many countries in the global south, has been beset with challenges in having a resilient infrastructure that is able to provide quality health services, promote health and prevent diseases.

He submitted that a well-skilled, motivated and adequate health workforce is critical to ending preventable deaths and building resilience against global threats.

The envoy said the UK International Development funding aligns with the Nigerian health workforce strategic plan geared at assisting the country to upskill its workers and improve health outcomes in the long run.

World Health Organisation’s (WHO) two-year HRH project aims to support government at national and sub-national levels, as well as regulatory bodies, professional associations and other key stakeholders to develop transformative strategies for scaling up the quantity and quality of health workers, including competency-based curricula development and reviews.

Montgomery said the UK provided the multi-million Pound to support healthcare staff recruitment and retention in three African countries, namely Kenya, Nigeria and Ghana to enhance resilience against global health challenges

Consequently, WHO has commended UK’s Department of Health and Social Care for a fresh funding commitment to help Nigeria develop its health staff in the pursuit of Universal Health Coverage (UHC).

The global health body noted that the £2 million grant would assist Nigeria in optimising performance, quality and impact of its health workforce through evidence-informed policies and strategies over a two-year period.

It would help to align investment in HRH with the current and future needs of the population and health systems; strengthen the capacity of institutions, including regulatory bodies, for effective public policy stewardship, leadership and governance, optimise health workers’ retention, equitable distribution and performance, and strengthen the management of health workforce data for monitoring and accountability. The project would also implement interventions in Nigeria.

The project is to draw on the technical capacity of WHO to strengthen health systems, including experience of implementing similar projects with appreciable results in the past. Implementation at sub-national levels with a focus on six states of Cross River, Enugu, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano and Lagos will build on the presence and technical support being provided to state governments through the 37 WHO sub-national offices in Nigeria.

WHO Representative in Nigeria, Dr. Walter Kazadi Mulombo, said that the strength of every health system reflects the capacity and adequacy of its health workforce necessary to deliver quality services to address population health needs.

For a resilient and effective health system, he said Nigeria must have adequate numbers of health workers, who are fit for purpose, motivated to perform, and equitably distributed across sub-national levels to enhance equity in access to their services by the population in need.

By Chukwuma Muanya and Nkechi Onyedika Ugoeze, Reuters

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