Frontpage News (3249)
The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, has said that the apex bank is committed to fully intervene in the health sector following the outbreak of Coronavirus in Nigeria.
The apex bank made this known yesterday at a consultative round table with stakeholders in Abuja. Emefiele explained that the CBN had decided to support the government by helping to develop specialist hospitals across the country. He said the bank’s intervention would be in the areas of diagnosis and surgery, pointing out that this would reduce medical tourism.
The Registrar, Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria, Dr Tajudeen Sanusi, has pleaded with the newly qualified medical doctors from the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, to give back to the system that gives them the opportunity of training at a relatively minimal cost.
Speaking before administering the Hippocratic Oath on the 52 doctors, whose training commenced in the university in 2010, Sanusi, at the College of Health Sciences, LAUTECH, Osogbo campus, said the parents and guardians of the inductees had expended a huge amount on their training.
President Muhammadu Buhari has appealed to workers in the health sector to show understanding with the administration in their demands, especially given the effects of the Coronavirus outbreak on the economy. He said his administration was bracing up for the challenges expected to follow the outbreak of the disease.
The President, who made the appeal on Tuesday when workers in the health sector the under the auspices of Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU) and Assembly Healthcare Professionals Associations (AHPA) paid him a courtesy call at the State House, Abuja, assured that government was looking into their issues with a view to resolving them.
Institute Of Medical Research To Develop Vaccine For Coronavirus
Site Admin
Nigeria’s Minister of State for Health, Sen Adeleke Olorunnimbe Mamora, on Monday, announced that the Nigeria Institute of Medical Research (NIMR) has determined the genetic sequencing of coronavirus causing COVID-19. According to him, NIMR is the first research institute in Africa to record such feat which he said would help scientists in the country to develop the vaccine to combat the virus.
Mamora made the announcement at the 34th anniversary of Healthcare magazine, award presentations and innovation conference themed “improving health with innovations, technology and sustainable financing” held at the Sheraton Hotel and Towers, Ikeja, Lagos on Monday.
Nigeria’s inflation rate rose to 12.20 per cent in February, up by 0.07 per cent from the 12.13 per cent recorded in January largely due to hike in prices of pharmaceutical products, air fares and foodstuff.
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) which measures inflation released yesterday by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that increases were recorded in all divisions that yielded the headline inflation. For instance, under core inflation, the highest increases were recorded in prices of pharmaceutical products, non-durable household goods, catering services, passenger transport by air, repair of furniture, maintenance and repair of personal transport equipment,
The Enugu State Ministry of Health on Monday said that the suspected coronavirus patient has been confirmed negative to the novel virus. A statement by the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, Dr. Ifeanyi Agujiobi, said that the suspect’s specimen sent to IRUA Specialist Hospital for investigation tested negative. 
The World Health Organization urged Middle Eastern governments Wednesday to be more forthcoming with information about new coronavirus infections in order to effectively combat the global pandemic.
“We can only control this disease if we have access to information that allows us to understand its dynamic in the region” Ahmed al-Mandhari, WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean director, told an online press conference from Cairo. “We have an opportunity to contain this pandemic in our region,” he added.
People, who suspect they have caught the novel coronavirus, should not take the popular drug ibuprofen without consulting a doctor, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said.
WHO gave the warning, on Tuesday, pointing to the ongoing research into possible negative effects. WHO’s spokesman, Christian Lindmeier, told a Geneva news conference that there are no recent studies that link the anti-inflammatory drug with increased mortality rates, but he added that experts are currently investigating the matter.
The Federal Government disclosed on Monday that despite the fact that coronavirus disease otherwise referred to as Covid-19 is yet to claim any life in Nigeria, the country was still at very high risk to it.
This is just as the government added France, Germany and Spain to its existing list of five high-risk countries with widespread community transmission. The Minister of State for Health, Adeleke Mamora, who was giving an update on the state of the Coronavirus in the country at a media briefing in Abuja, stressed the need to improve surveillance, detection and risk communications. He said:”Despite the fact that we have not recorded a confirmed COVID-19 case in the last one week in Nigeria, it is important to remember that we are still at high risk
Tuberculosis: Stakeholders call for more funding, treatment to meet 2030 target
Site Admin
Relevant stakeholders have stressed the need to scale up funding, improve access to prevention and treatment of tuberculosis to enable Nigeria to meet the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) target of ending the epidemic.
The stakeholders made the call during a news conference on Tuesday in Abuja to mark the 2020 World TB Day with the theme “It’s Time to End TB in Nigeria. Dr Berthrand Odume, the Country Director of KNCV Foundation Nigeria, said that the efforts became necessary to accelerate an end to the TB epidemic in Nigeria and globally.
More...
Nigeria has declared five days of free health services targeting nearly 20 million people across 409 lowest-performing local government areas. For five days each in March, April and June, residents in the affected local government areas will get free healthcare, medical consultation and minor surgeries, attend health talks and receive counselling under the Integrated Medical Outreach Programme (I-MOP).
Vice President Yemi Osinbajo launched the programme at the Township Health Cenre in Bwari, one of the six council areas in the FCT,
NAFDAC outlines measures to control illicit drugs in Nigeria
Site Admin
Director-General, National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Prof. Christianah Mojisola Adeyeye, has said the agency has finalised plans to enhance control of narcotics and psychotropic substances.
She disclosed that one of the control objectives of the agency is to ensure availability for medical and scientific uses while minimising the possibility of diversion to illicit channels and abuse. Speaking at the launch and dissemination of the 2019 Annual Report of the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) in Lagos,
Five new cases of the COVID-19 have been confirmed in Nigeria, the new cases are reported to be from the United State (US) and the United Kingdom (UK). The Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire who confirmed this in an emergency press conference, said another five new cases of Coronavirus have been imported into the country.
The five new cases, according to him is bringing the total number of confirmed cases in the country to eight, even though the first two patients have been successfully treated and discharged. The minister, who made the announcement at an emergency press conference to update Nigerians on the COVID-19 spread said three of the new cases arrived from the United States (US); two of them a Nigerian mother and her six-week-old baby.
Coronavirus: Shut all borders now — Senate, House of Reps, NMA, others
Site Admin
The Senate, House of Representatives and the Nigerian Medical Association, NMA, yesterday, asked the Federal Government to shut all borders and urgently consider banning non-Nigerian travellers from countries with high risk of Coronavirus (COVID-19).
The NMA wants a total shutdown of the nation’s borders, saying, at least, 730 people from high-risk countries of Coronavirus enter the country on a daily basis. This came on a day President Muhammadu Buhari approved the suspension of National Sports Festival billed for next week in Edo State, following confirmation of a third case of COVID-19 in Nigeria.
