Health, Defence, Economy dominate News (Video)

Health, Defence, Economy dominate News

Hand washing

An organisation, Women 4 Woman, is offering 2-day free medical services to 500 destitute including Almajiris, street urchins, hawkers and others in Kaduna to mark the World Hand Washing Day.

Founder of the organisation, Hajiya Fatima Abubakar, said that the event involved medical doctors, nurses and volunteers.

Abubakar said the aim was to educate beneficiaries on the importance of hand washing to reduce risks of contracting common infections.

She said that the event would focus on educating children and other residents on the simplest and most effective measure of preventing diseases through hand washing.

According to her, the hands are the commonest highways to the transmission and spread of bacteria, pathogens and viruses that cause diseases, food-borne illness and infections.

“We chose to celebrate the day through educating the Almajiris and other destitute children simply because we feel they are always left behind in terms of educating them on health matters.

“And we feel they need to be educated like every other child about preventive ways to avert spread of diseases.

“We must teach them how to wash their hands before and after eating to reduce spread of various diseases associated with lack of washing hands.

“These children eat food without cleaning their hands and we feel that there is need to educate them,” Abubakar said.

She urged other NGOs and CSOs, state and federal ministries of health to double efforts in raising awareness among rural and urban children on the importance of hand washing.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the event was supported by another organisation, Foundation for the Protection of Women and Children.

Head of the foundation, Ramatu Tijjani, used the opportunity to appeal to religious leaders to take up the campaign and spread the message of hand washing across all communities to enhance public health.

Cancer

A UK based doctor, Femi Ogunremi, has urged the three tiers of government in Nigeria to initiate policies to protect women from developing cancer, thereby saving many lives.

Ogunremi, Chief Executive Officer of Monitor Healthcare Limited (MHL), an international medical technology company, made the plea on Monday in Lagos at a free training on “Breast Cancer Screening.

He said the policies should include investing in simple tools for screening such as the “Breast-i’’.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the training was organised by MHL in commemoration of the Breast Cancer Awareness Month marked annually throughout October.

Ogunremi said: “Breast-i is a revolutionary self-use, portable, non-diagnostic screening device used to screen for cancerous lumps in the breast and a product of years of research.

“The device is quite useful, because it is a new technology whereby you use red light to pick abnormal cancer cells.

“In our society where people cannot afford a lot of the screening such as mammogram and lack of a national screening, as a first line screening tool, this is a way.

“It will be a good tool in the hands of our government and useful in poor resource areas of the country.

“If the government can set up policies to protect our ladies using things like the Breast-i as a simple tool and get it on the desk of every doctor, it will help to reduce the scourge of cancer.“

Protest

Mrs Olubunmi Bola, Director of Finance, overseeing the Federal Ministry of Finance, has urged protesting workers of the Investments and Securities Tribunal to remain calm and law abiding in their quest for better working conditions.

The director assured the workers that their demands of accrued benefits in promotion and transfers would be well attended to.

Defence

The United States Consulate in Nigeria has commenced a training seminar, with the theme: “Defence and National Security Reporting”, for defence journalists on national security and military reportage.

Mr Russell Brooks, the US Public Affairs Officer, at the opening of the three-day seminar on Monday in Lagos, said the aim was to widen the knowledge of journalists covering the military.

According to Brooks, the seminar is designed to help the media to further appreciate its huge responsibility of reporting accurately on national security and the defence beat.

He emphasised how the US was passionate about Nigeria’s democracy, adding that it would always support the country’s democracy and its democratic institutions.

NAN reports that the three-day seminar would centre on military and national identity, language of the military, specific aspects of defence and national security journalism, among others.

World Bank

The World Bank Board of Directors says it has approved the third Regional Disease Surveillance Systems Enhancement (REDISSE) Project and committed additional 120 million dollars to the work plan.

Mr John Paul Clark, the World Bank Senior Health Specialist, disclosed this on Monday at the opening of the ongoing technical sub-committee meeting of the REDISSE project in Lagos.

According to him, the 367.8 million-dollar project aims to strengthen disease surveillance and response systems at regional levels, in ECOWAS Member States and Mauritania.

REDISSE project covers all the 15 ECOWAS countries and Mauritania in five-year phases from 2016 to 2023.

The first phase covers three countries, including Guinea, Senegal and Sierra Leone; the second phase covers four countries of Nigeria, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia and Togo.

Its implementation is in the third phase, covering four countries- Benin, Mali, Niger and Mauritania.

Clark said: “REDISSE project is now providing credits and grants to 11 countries in West African Health Organisation (WAHO) with the budget growing to almost 400milion dollars.

“REDISSE is the World Bank’s Flagship investment in both Health Security and the One Health agenda.”

Reviewing implementation of the programme, Clark expressed displeasure that REDISSE 1 (Guinea, Sierra Leone and Senegal) has a disbursement ratio of only 14 per cent, compelling the downgrading in June 2018 from Satisfactory to Moderate.

According to him, this can fall to unsatisfactory “unless the pace of implementation increases’’.

The REDISSE 2 (Togo, Guinea Bissau, Nigeria and Liberia) has disbursement ratio of nine per cent; a big portion of which is for activation of the Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication in Nigeria due to the Lassa fever.

“It also warns that the project is at risk of ratings down-grade this yea; as such, we need to take our work here very seriously.

“We need to see both what is and what is not working well in planning and implementation; what can we do better?

“This is our opportunity to discuss the challenges we face openly and to identify some best practices.

“To advise each other on how best to move forward toward our objective of building capacity to prevent, detect and respond to disease threats in West Africa,” Clark said.

Declaring the meeting open, the WAHO Director-General, Prof. Stanley Okolo, charged participants to assess the status of implementation of the recommendations of the first Regional Steering Committee Meeting.

Okolo, represented by Dr Carlos Brito, said: “this meeting has a `heavy task’ of producing strategy because success of the implementation of the REDISSE Project is very important to us.

”I commend and thank the technical partners– WHO, OIE, RAHC, CCISD, FMx and other partners and the Nigerian Government for accepting to host the meeting.’’

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the two-day technical sub-committee meeting has in attendance all the 15 ECOWAS member States and Mauritania. (NAN)