But first, a huge credit must go to the Lagos State government. In particular, the Governor, Babatunde Fashola, his Health Commissioner, Dr Jide Idris, and his Special Adviser on Health, Dr Yewande Adeshina deserve high praise indeed. Similarly, President Goodluck Jonathan and the Health Minister, Prof Onyebuchi Chukwu deserve commendation for their co-ordinating role, robust leadership and tireless work in containing the Ebola spread.Special praise must go to Dr Adadevoh and her team at First Consultant Hospital. I dread to imagine what would have happened in Lagos, and indeed Nigeria in entirety, had the index case not been taken to that hospital and placed under the care of Dr Adadevoh. Her foresight and effective management of that case probably saved our collective bacon.
We cannot leave out the World Health Organisation, WHO, and other foreign health experts who were on the ground and in the forefront providing us with support. However, when you think that there are many more WHO personnel and foreign health workers in Ebola-stricken countries such as Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, and these countries have not managed to contain Ebola and in fact, the disease is on the increase in those places, you begin to appreciate the more, the effectiveness of Nigeria’s local strategy and response.
Nigeria tackled Ebola disease head-on and won. It was text-book epidemiology triumph. In doing this, we probably helped prevent greater spread of the disease to other parts of the continent.
So kudos to all involved. They have all done very well. And you know you’ve done good when even America sends its personnel to study how you’ve done it!
But how did Ebola get to Nigeria?
Posts
0 Comments