the Federal Government said despite the impressive drop in malaria prevalence from 42% in 2010 to 23% in 2020, Nigeria’s dominance at the top of the global prevalence ranking must cease.
Barrister Hasan Abdullahi, minister of environment, reaffirmed the administration led by President Muhammadu Buhari’s commitment to further reducing the malaria pandemic to the absolute minimum by intentional targeted interventions in policy execution on Monday.
Nearly 173 million Nigerians are thought to be at risk of infection, according to estimates.
Due to the significant amount of man-hours lost as a result of this worrying scenario, the absence from work by infected adults and the absence from school on the part of infected schoolchildren are basic and important issues of concern.
Similarly, it is projected that Nigerians lose hundreds of billions of Naira annually if every infected person spent just 2,000 Naira on average to cure a bout of malaria twice a year.
The minister said, “Several international, national, and local initiatives are being done to tackle the Malaria epidemic.
The Nigeria End Malaria Council (NEMC) was only recently inaugurated by His Excellency, Muhammadu Buhari, President and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
He gave it the responsibility to ensure the successful implementation of the Council’s program, which should result in N2 trillion in savings from the estimated economic burden of the disease by 2030.
According to the President, “The Federal Ministry of Environment is firmly behind him in accomplishing the onerous aim set for the NEMC, which is quite attainable with the appropriate implementation of policies leveraging teamwork and partnership.”
He claims that the super endemic disease can be controlled less effectively with malaria case management.
Additionally, he pointed out that while using insecticide-treated (Mosquito) nets to decrease adult mosquito bites is showing some progress, achieving the intended impact is regrettably not possible or a method that can be relied upon.
“It remains crucial that hierarchically, effective mosquito control takes the form of exclusion — removal of suitable vector habitat through sound hygiene and sanitation which stops breeding by preventing egg laying,” continued Abdullahi. “Life cycle control — larviciding, to reduce/eliminate egg hatching; and oiling & aduiticiding, which are used for controlling pupacy and adulthood, respectively.”
Speaking at the occasion on behalf of the Minister of Health, Dr. Perpetual Uhomoibhi, National Coordinator, Malaria Elimination Programme, highlighted that the Ministry was collaborating with relevant stakeholders, including development partners, to develop practical methods for reducing the threat.
She said that in 21 of the federation’s 36 states, the Ministry was already treating children under the age of five through its agencies.
Uhomoibhi said that Nigeria will be the first in line to receive the WHO-approved malaria vaccine when it became available.
