By; JACOB ONJEWU DICKSON
Yakubu Gowon Centre and partners with support from the North East Development Commission has flagged-off Hepatitis screening and vaccination across three Yobe Senatorial zones to reduce mortality resulting from the disease.
The Yobe Team Lead, Mr. Nduka Ozo who disclosed this at Damaturu Specialist Hospital, revealed that a total of 2,000 individuals would benefit from the vaccination but for the screening; it may exceed the number.
“The North East Development Commission has realized the need for hepatitis intervention in the region and Nigeria as a whole. In the past years, about 90,000 people have benefitted from this intervention in the northeast. In the 2nd phase because of scarce resources, we are doing an additional 6,000 in Gombe, Taraba and Yobe states”.
“The 2,000 in each state is just for the vaccination, we can screen more than that, because it is a serious concern, a lot of people are living with the virus ignorantly, but thank God the turn out here is encouraging.
“To further support the state government, we have also installed a viral load machine at the Specialist Hospital Damaturu” he said.
The Chief Medical Director, Damaturu Specialists Hospital represented by the Chairman, Medical Advisory Committee, Dr. Abubakar Kawu-Mala Geidam as well as the Chief Nursing Officer, Bala Suleiman thanked the Yakubu Gowon Centre and partners for providing the intervention.
According to them, “the prevalence of the disease in the state capital is minimal but also it is a salient killer. People hardly come to hospital for checkups until when they are sick”, they said.
The screening and the vaccination exercises are held concurrently at Damaturu, Gashua and Potiskum Specialists Hospitals across the state and would last for three days.
