‘Why we want North-East health emergency response to continue’

When 15 year-old-Usman arrived at the Nursing Quarters of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) camp in Maiduguri, Borno State, he was weak and could not stand because he was highly anaemic based on medical reports at the camp. He was dewormed and placed on treatment and monitored by the medical personnel of the Federal Government’s […]

When 15 year-old-Usman arrived at the Nursing Quarters of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) camp in Maiduguri, Borno State, he was weak and could not stand because he was highly anaemic based on medical reports at the camp. He was dewormed and placed on treatment and monitored by the medical personnel of the Federal Government’s Health and Nutrition Emergency Response Project (HNERP).  He gradually recovered and joined the team of IDPs who welcomed the Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, and other government officials who came to inspect facilities at the camp.

Another case was that of baby Hadiza. She was one of the children who suffered from malnutrition in the Maiduguri camp. Malnutrition in the state had reached a level that the Federal Ministry of Health had to declare a nutrition emergency and subsequently provided intervention under the health project.

With some intervention such as at Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) at the camp, Hadiza’s mother said the baby got better, grew fatter and added humourously and with joy that hair had started growing on her hairless head.

Like Hadiza, some children under five years were malnourished and exhibited characteristics of kwashiorkor in some IDP camps in Borno State, particularly at the Jiddari Clinic in Jere Local Government Area. The Jiddari clinic was chosen as one of the health facilities for the nutrition emergency response under HNERP.

Aisha Bukar, 11 months, and Mohammed Abdullahi, six months, were some of the children admitted at the clinic. Their mothers said they had diarrhoea for some days. They received free nutrition supplements and were treated with Oral Rehydration Therapy (ORS) and other medications free of charge and they quickly recovered.

There is also a psycho-social support component of the HNERP aimed at providing mental health and social intervention to the traumatised people in the state.

Ad hoc staff provide psycho-social health services to patients at the camps while patients with serious psycho-social problems are referred to the Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital in Maiduguri.

Residents in the state have called for extension and sustainability of the Federal Government’s HNERP to sustain nutritional, psychological and other health interventions.

Community Leader at the Gwoza CAN Camp, Mr. John Gwamma, thanked the government for the intervention in treating their ailments and called for sustainability of the programme.

Displaced persons at the Teachers’ Village IDP Camp in Maiduguri and other camps in Muna, Gamboru and other parts of Borno and the other targeted states said they and their children had benefited from the health intervention and wanted it to continue.

Some common ailments treated at the camps included malaria, diarrhoea and upper respiratory tract infections.

Borno State Commissioner for Health, Haruna Msehlia, said the state had received drugs from the intervention and dispersed to local government areas to meet the needs of the people.

The insurgency in the six North East states had debilitating impact on the health of the people. Millions of people were displaced in Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Taraba and Yobe states. The situation resulted in the destruction of lives, property, including health facilities and supplies. The result was inability to deliver quality services to the vulnerable, especially in the camps and host communities.

With this pathetic situation, President Muhammadu Buhari inaugurated the Joint Inter-Ministerial Task Force Committee (IMTF) to tackle the humanitarian crisis in the zone. Health sector response was one of the strategic interventions; especially in Borno State, the epicentre of the insurgency.

The Federal Ministry of Health implemented the HNERP between February and July 2017. It provided emergency nutrition and strengthened the health surveillance system, targeting displaced persons in camps and host communities.

Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, said N4bn was expended in purchasing relief materials, including drugs and medical consumables, hospital equipment, capacity building and deployment of volunteer health workers, adding that a two-pronged approach was adopted solely to provide basic medical services to the affected population and strengthen the pillars of the health system.

He enumerated the achievements of the project thus: 23,575 treated malaria cases, treatment of 5,446 under-five children with diarrhoea, a total of 50,999 children immunised, 314 treated trauma cases and the number of women attending ante-natal clinics was 18,436.

Prof. Adewole said the number of deliveries by skilled birth attendants was 1,584, the number of acutely malnourished children treated was 4,947, number of  women ante-natal clinics attended to was 1,856, while the number of women counselled on family planning was 7,143.

The project provided health services in 25 accessible local government areas in Borno State and drew its personnel from the six states of the zone.

Speaking during the mid-term review meeting of the HNERP in Maiduguri, Gov. Kashim Shettima said the programme had not only made tangible impact on the lives of his citizens, but that it was helping to rebuild the health system following the insurgency in the state.

“I dare to say of all the interventions from the federal side, the health response has simply been the best and most productive,” he said. 

The governor also appreciated President Muhammadu Buhari for showing commitment to the re-building of the North East.

Also, the Chairman, Senate Ad hoc Committee on the North East, Senator Shehu Sani, during the review of the mid-term report of the HNERP in Abuja, described the programme as being responsive to the needs of the people at the IDP camps in Borno State.

He said previously there was a disconnect between success stories on the response for IDPs in the North East in the papers and what the true situation was in the camps.

While noting that some positive responses had been observed from the activities of the ministry, he said more still needed to be done to address the challenges the IDPs were facing.

The Director, Special Duties in the Federal Ministry of Health, Dr. (Mrs) Ngozi Azodoh, also said there was need for extension and expansion of the HNERP in Borno State.

Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, called for the extension of the response, saying there was need for sustainability and need to empower states in the zone to take over the response.

He said, “It wouldn’t make the targeted impact if the curtains were drawn on it after six months. The drugs that we brought to Borno would last them for the next two years. We are quite confident that extending it would not be as costly as the initial flag off. We don’t have to buy new ambulances, we are not buying new delivery trucks, we are not buying new drugs, what we need to do is just to keep the personnel and some money for logistics.”

Crisis looms over mental, neuropsychiatric healthcare

Findings have revealed that crisis looms in the provision of mental and neuropsychiatric healthcare to thousands of affected IDPs in the North East due to the recent end of the Federal Government’s HNERP.

The Boko Haram insurgency not only caused deaths and loss of property, but also led to severe trauma and psychosocial disorders thereby drastically increasing the number of mental and neuropsychiatric patients in the zone.

This situation, Daily Trust investigation shows, is gravely compounded by severe drug abuse by a huge population of the IDPs and those affected by the insurgency in an effort to sedate themselves.

“We treated over 8,000 patients under the project, majority of them IDPs,” Dr. Ibrahim Abdullahi Wakawa, the Medical Director of the Maiduguri Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital, told Daily Trust.

He said there was urgent need for the elongation of the intervention programme because mental health conditions were not like general physical conditions for which you intervened for a week or two and the affected person got better.

“We are administering the remnants of the psychotropic medication the government provided under the programme. But once the remnants gets exhausted and the government does not renew the programme or introduce another form of it, I must be candid, we are going to find ourselves in a very difficult situation. It is scary to imagine the situation the thousands of patients will be plunged into, the medical director warned.