News Editor
By David Odama
Barely hours of reported cases of cholera in 6 out the 25 Local Government Areas of Niger state, the number of victims have risen to 279 as at Thursday.
This is even as the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said it will donate essential commodities to the affected six LGAs to avert the spread of the disease to other areas.
The UNICEF Chief of Kaduna Field Office, Dr. Gerida Birukila disclosed this to journalists after inspecting the isolation centre at the old wing of late Senator Idris Ibrahim Kuta Primary Health Care (PHC) centre along old airport road Minna.
Though the center has been in existence, Dr. Birukila said the UNICEF in beefing up the facility situated right inside the heart of Minna metropolis to meet expected standards and demands for cholera treatment.
Dut to the emergency and experte required, the UNICEF according to him will be working in collaboration with Niger state government and other health based organisations including World Health Organisation (WHO) to halt the spread of the disease.
“As of today (Thursday), available records showed that the number of deaths so far are children and they are also more represented in the 297 suspected cases we have at the moment”.
The UNICEF Field Officer further explained, “We have four new cases, they have just been admitted here and twenty three other cases in other local government areas, some of them are positive and others negative”.
Also speaking, the UNICEF Health Specialist with the Kaduna Field Office, Dr. Sule Mele said case of cholera was first discovered two weeks ago within Minna metropolitan which consists of LGAs; Chanchaga and Bosso, and gradually it has spread to four other LGAs.
Dr. Mele said, “So far, we have over two hundred suspected cases and 50 percent are positive for rapid diagnostic tests. And there are likely increase of cases”.
The UNICEF is doing all that is humanly possible to stem the spread by sensitizing the general public and as well managing suspected cases as they are being isolated and treated accordingly.
Speaking on the supportive efforts so far, Mele said the UNICEF has donated essential commodities and ready to set up cholera treatment units across all other LGAs with suspected cases, ‘because we cannot bring all the suspects here and we are going to preposition the commodities to units’.
Director Public Health in the Ministry of Secondary and Tertiary Health in Niger state, Dr. Ibrahim Idris who had earlier commended the UNICEF for timely response said the state government has set up treatment and isolation centres to mitigate the spread in addition to sensitizing target audience on how to manage the situation.
