Malaria: Stakeholders Charge FG On More Funds

As Nigerians joined the
rest of the world to mark the World Malaria Day, stakeholders in the Medical and Health Sector have called on the federal government to make more funds available for the effective tackling of malaria scourge.
The President, Malaria Society of Nigeria (MSN), Dr Babajide Puddicombe made the call last Sunday during an interview with journalists in Ota, Ogun State, after the public campaign to mark the Malaria Day.
Puddicombe who explained that malaria was a major disease that had claimed the lives of many people including pregnant women and children in the country regretted that inadequate funding for the fight against the disease had been a major factor leading to the deaths, maintaining that with proper funding, the deadly disease would be tackled in the country.
Puddicombe noted however that the death rate from malaria from the year 2000 to date had decreased due largely to public awareness by the federal, state and local governments as well as Non-governmental Organisations like the MSN and urged every citizen to partner with the government to defeat malaria. According  to him, “let us all work together because deaths from malaria can be prevented”.
Also speaking, medical personnel in the Rivers State Primary Health Care Department told The Tide’s Health Desk that the insufficient funds in the health sector had militated against the eradication of not just malaria but most preventable diseases in the country.
The personnel who pleaded anonymity noted that malaria is a complex disease that needs adequate funding  set to a lot of machineries in motion for its fight to be successful.
While commending the governments at all levels for the efforts so far injected in the fight against malaria, he urged people at the helms of affairs to further make the funds available as well as materials for the prevention of the disease.
According to him “I do know that the government on its part is trying but another problem is those that the funds are released to.  As soon as the money enters their  hands, they divert it and even hoard the materials like the nets and insecticides that the government had given them to give to the populace.  While others are without reach of these materials, they have been in quantum and eventually waste them”.
It should be noted that this year’s World Malaria Day, was marked last Saturday, April25, 2015 with the theme ‘Invest In The Future: Defeat Malaria.

Lady Godknows Ogbulu

New ambulances and hospital complex inaugurated by the Minister of State for Health, Chief Fidelis Nwankwo, at the Federal Teaching Hospital, Abakaliki last Friday. Photo: NAN