The National Coordinator, Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu, has urged government at all levels to protect the health of Nigerians through evidence based prevention, integrated disease surveillance and response activities.
Dr. Ihekweazu, who was represented by Technical Assistant of Communication, NCDC, Dr. Lawal Bakare, stated this during the 7th Annual Symposium of the Health Writers Association of Nigeria (HEWAN), in Lagos.
Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu
According to him, this will reduce the adverse impact of predictable and unpredicted public health emergencies.
“Every report of cases makes us get accurate measure of the burden of infectious diseases in Nigeria. It ensures Nigeria to meet the international obligations as a member of the World Health Assembly.
“Last year, we had to go back to Borno to control some outbreak of diseases in the state, and this made us to discover the polio case. We had to collaborate with all the local governments in the state to be able to detect and respond to all the disease outbreaks in the state,” Ihekweazu said.
He said that the support of every state was needed in order to develop more laboratory service network, to support the detection, prevention and response to critical infectious diseases.
“Recruiting more personnel outside the country to train people on how to control every outbreak diseases is very important. It helps us to trace every outbreak in every local government and state in the country,” he added.
