Onyebuchi Ezigbo
Civil Society in Malaria Control, Immunisation and Nutrition (ACOMIN) has said most of the states in the country have failed to provide basic anti malaria medicines to protect pregnant women from malaria scourge.
It expressed concern that progress at curbing maternal deaths and infant mortality rate due malaria is being threatened by poor funding by state governments.
According to ACOMIN, malaria remained a major health burden for Nigeria, with the country recording the highest number of global cases (27 per cent) and also accounting for the highest number of deaths (23 per cent) globally.
It said available statistics showed the pregnant women and children under age five are most vulnerable to malaria.
Speaking to THISDAY shortly after a quarterly advocacy meeting of the group in Abuja, ACOMIN National Coordinator, Mr. Ayo Ipinmoye said the COVID19 pandemic has significantly affected the availability of resources for the anti malaria programme.
According to Ipinmoye, funding for anti malaria programme from development partners and donor agencies has dropped significantly in recent years.
“Global Fund is giving Nigeria long lasting mosquito treated nets and through mass campaign every household in the states will be able to get them. They are also giving us other essential medicines.
“But Global Fund asked our state governments to provide preventive treatment for pregnant women by making sure that such medicines (SPEs) like fansidar, Amala.
“The state governments are supposed to provide that so that when the Global Fund is providing all of these more expensive ones, the cheapest of the medicines are supposed to be provided by our state governments and they are not being provided.
“Virtually every state we go now, there is a stock out. Because if we have this provided and women take them, we will not be having all these incidences of women dying due to malaria or losing their babies,” he said.
Speaking on the utilisation of the grant from Global Fund, Ipinmoye said that ACOMIN and others community based organizations are working across 13 states of federation equipping the people with relevant knowledge, skills and resources.
He said that one of the key achievements of the project was that several communities have been able to mobilise resources to solve their health needs rather than waiting for government.
For instance, he said that one evidence of community ownership was recorded in Funakai, Local government Area, Bake ward in Gombe state where a new Primary Health Centre is being built.With regard to ensuring equity in the provision of healthcare services in Nigeria Ipinmoye said that ACOMIN is working to see that there is equal access to malaria services.
“Every person unresponsive of their socio-economic class, gender, ethnicity, demography and location should have equal rights and unrestricted access to malaria services, malaria interventions and ultimately, proper healthcare services, he said.
Ipinmoye said that marginalised population such as people staying in Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camp and hard-to-reach communities are often neglected and deprived of access to health services.
He therefore said that it is important that healthcare services are deliberated targeted at the neglected population to ensure equity of health services.
He said that ACOMIN has also observed a disproportionate distribution of health workers in the country, with urban areas being saturated with qualified health workers, leaving the rural communities with a few or no qualified health workers.
The Coordinator of National Malaria Elimination Programme Dr, Perpetua Uhomoibhi who also spoke THISDAY, said that the efforts the federal government and it’s partners were yielding fruit as malaria prevalence dropped from 42 percent in 2010 to 27 per cent to 23 per cent in 2018.
Despite the improvement recorded by the country, the 2021 World Malaria Report painted a gloomy picture about the prospect of Nigeria’s attaining the global target of reducing malaria and disease scourge by 40 percent by the year 2030.
