As Government Takes Immunization To Flood Victims’ Camps
BY RAYMOND OZOJI
Awka Contrary to insinuations in some sections of the online media that persons displaced by flood are suffering hunger, malnutrition, mosquito bites, government rejection and abandonment at the holding centres across the Anambra state, the Commissioner for Health, Dr. Ben Afam Obidike says all are totally untrue because flood victims get the very best of care and attention.
Obidike who spoke with our correspondent in an exclusive interview, explained that the IDPs are receiving comprehensive medical care in all the camps across the state and that the Governor Professor Chukwuma Charles Soludo has ensured constant supply of drugs and other medications to meet the health needs of the flood victims.
Obidike maintained that government is spending huge sums of money to mitigate possibilities of outbreaks or epidemics as he observed that the victims are clustered in their respective refuge camps, adding that apart from surgeries, antenatal care, routine anti-malaria drugs and some others administered on them, government has taken immunization to the various camps to inoculate children against preventable diseases.
He said no deaths have been recorded at the holding centres and that the medical teams in all the identified internally displaced persons camps are working day and night; providing adequate response services and ensuring good hygiene practices in the camps due to population densities.
According to him, most of the IDP camps are linked to general hospitals or primary healthcare centres for referrals especially at General Hospital Onitsha where the Commissioner informed that Governor Soludo mandated that no flood victim referred to the hospital should pay a dime after treatment of any ailment.
The Commissioner also stated that Cesarian Sessions have been held at the IDP camps where women delivered twin babies safe and sound and they didn’t pay a Kobo.
That routine antenatal checks and scans are also being conducted on pregnant women at the IDP camps and their routine drugs also given to them. The Commissioner equally stated that the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have both taken a tour of the IDP camps across the state and did not ascertain cholera outbreak or any other outbreak while extolling hygiene practices at the holding centres.
He said the Ministry of Health has distributed more than a thousand mosquito nets to IDP camps and that prior to the flooding, about 3.8 million mosquito nets were shared to Ndi-Anambra to protect them from mosquito bites and malaria infections.
That the Governor Professor Chukwuma Charles Soludo had on his visits to the flood victims’ camps personally distributed mosquito nets to them noting that the governor was consistently extending compassion, affection and empathy to the IDPs.He said the governor has paid unscheduled visits to over six internally displaced persons camps and on each occasion reassured the flood victims that his government will not abandon them to their fate.
Again, the Commissioner reiterated the fact that government will begin immunization at the IDP camps inorder to administer COVID-19 vaccines and other vaccines to forestall health crisis, stressing that government will continue to carry out comprehensive healthcare services, provide food and other relief materials for the upkeep and well-being of flood victims in their respective holding centres.