By Adedapo Adesanya
The federal government is partnering with the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI) for emergency vaccine donations in case of a shortage amidst an expectant surge in cholera outbreaks across the country.
The chief executive of Gavi, Dr Sania Nishtar, in a post on her X handle @SaniaNishtar, on Thursday, said the body was concerned about the cholera outbreak in Nigeria and was ready to support the country in its response.
“Deeply concerned about the ongoing #cholera outbreak in Nigeria. @Gavi and partners are closely monitoring the cholera outbreak, and stand ready to support the government to quickly respond, including to request emergency vaccine doses where needed.
“The global cholera stockpile, which is funded by Gavi, is currently fully replenished and ready to help contain outbreaks and protect those at highest risk,” she stated.
This is as the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) activated the Emergency Operation Centre to contain the gravity of the situation in the country earlier this week.
The Director General of the NCDC, Dr Jide Idris, said the EOC would serve as the nerve centre for the coordination of response across the country.
It would also support affected states, and facilitate rapid communication, data analysis, and decision-making processes.
“It will ensure efficient deployment of needed resources, strengthen surveillance and diagnostic capacity and capabilities, enhance case management, training and intensify public awareness and community engagement activities,” Idris started.
He noted that experts who conducted the risk assessment last week placed Nigeria at high risk of increased cholera transmission and impact.
On his part, the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Professor Muhammad Ali Pate, has called for a multi-sectorial approach to forestall outbreaks of infectious diseases like Cholera, Typhoid Fever and Tuberculosis.
He said the approach should not only be biomedical which is curative, noting that many diseases are socially determined, hence, the right public policies must be put in place to provide social safety nets for vulnerable and poor people.
“There are many diseases that are socially determined; they are diseases of largely the population that are vulnerable and poor who live in inadequate housing, with low sanitation, who don’t have enough food, who are malnourished or whose occupation exposes them to certain disease conditions,” the minister said in a television interview.
“So, to address population health, there is the biomedical which are certain diseases that we handle but there are some that go beyond that, and are multi-sectorial in terms of the determinant of why those diseases occur and how to respond to them.
“It’s a whole of government and whole of society efforts that is necessary to improve the health and wellbeing of any population.”
