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  • Over 3,112 visual impaired patients get free surgery in Kebbi

    Over 3,112 visual impaired patients get free surgery in Kebbi

    “The Sight Savers”, an International Non-Governmental Organisation, has so far treated 3,112 patients diagnosed with trachoma in Kebbi state.

    Mr Ezra Yarima, a facilitator from the organisation, disclosed this to newsmen on Thursday in Birnin Kebbi, shortly after the inauguration of an advisory committee on neglected tropical diseases set up by the Kebbi Government.

    Trachoma is an eye infection that causes blindness.

    “The NGO, in collaboration with the state’s Ministry of Health, had provided ‘trachomatous trichiasis’ surgery to 3,112 patients suffering from the disease from 2015 to date,’’ he said.

    He described the state as endemic to five tropical neglected diseases such as Onchocerciasis (river blindness), Lymphatic Filariasis (Elephantiasis), Trachoma (Blinding disease).

    Others include, Schistosomiasis (Bilharziasis) and soil transmitted helminths (Intestinal worms).

    According to him, river blindness, one of the neglected tropical diseases is found in 14 local government areas of the state.

    “The disease is caused by bacteria in places that are arid with poor hygiene; poor sanitation and poor access to water, which if not treated can cause blindness.

    “For those who live in endemic areas, we have provided mass administration of medicine free of charge to significant number of people,” he said.

    Yarima expressed confidence that composition of the newly inaugurated advisory committee, which comprised officials from different government ministries and agencies in the state, would make the NGO work effectively in line with its mandate.

    He commended the commitment of the state government in providing the right leadership and financial commitment to overcome the identified neglected tropical diseases in the state.

    NAN

  • FCTA director says no confirmed case of monkey pox in Abuja

    FCTA director says no confirmed case of monkey pox in Abuja

    Dr Humpherey Okoroukwu, Acting Director, Public Health of the Federal Capital Territory Administration said there is no confirmed case of monkey pox in Abuja.

    Okoroukwu in an interview in Abuja on Thursday said that though there  were two suspected cases reported at Gwarimpa General Hospital in Abuja.

    He explained that he was called by the Medical Director of the hospital that cases suspected to be monkey pox were  reported and he led a team of health workers to investigate them.

    According to him, the sample of the suspected cases of a man and a woman had been taken to a reference laboratory for a test and they were waiting for the result.

    “I can tell you authoritatively that there is no confirmed case of monkey pox in the territory.

    “Nobody should panic because we have not confirmed any case and do not hope to confirm any and there is nothing wrong for people to report any suspected case” he said

    The Director urged people to imbibe culture of cleanliness to ,imi,ise chances of contracting the disease.

    He added that rodents and monkey of Africa specie are the vectors of monkey pox and urged the residents  to avoid direct contact with such animals, dead or alive, as well as the people suspected to be infected.

    Okoroukwu enjoined health workers to take universal precautions prescribed while discharging their duties.

    NAN

  • NSCDC to sanitise strip clubs and hotels in Kwara

    NSCDC to sanitise strip clubs and hotels in Kwara

    Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps ( NSCDC ) in Kwara has pledged to sanitise hotels and clubs engaged in strip dancing and other vices in the state.

    The Commandant, Mr Adeyinka Ayinla, made the pledge on Thursday in Ilorin when he paid courtesy visit to the state’s Commissioner for Information, Alhaji Mahmud Ajeigbe.

    The commandant said he was newly posted to the state and decided that it was important to partner with the Ministry of Information in promoting peace and stability.

    He explained that the NSCDC would commence investigation into issues deliberated on during courtesy visits to stakeholders.

    The issues, he added, included strip-dancing in hotels, cultism, kidnappings, ritual killings, oil diversion in Baruten Local Government and Nigerian refugees crisis in the Mediterranean.

    Ayinla told the commissioner that they were saddled with responsibility of partnering with many security agencies to ensure peace and stability in the country.

    Earlier, Ajeigbe had pledged the ministry’s readiness to partner with the corps.

    He, however, said “everybody should be security conscious and the society needs to assist security operatives in the area of intelligence.”

    NAN

  • Ogun boasts of 11,636 cooperative societies

    Ogun boasts of 11,636 cooperative societies

    About  11, 636 cooperative societies have so far registered in Ogun to promote commerce and investment, according to an official.

    Mr Gbenga Adenmosun, the Commissioner for Community Development and Cooperatives, disclosed this during an oversight visit to his ministry by the State House of Assembly Committee on Community Development and Cooperatives in Abeokuta on Wednesday.

    He said out of the figure, 221 of the cooperative societies were registered by the government between January and August this year.

    The Ogun commissioner said additional 449 Community Development Associations ( CDAs ) and 19 Community Development Councils were also registered during the period to facilitate grassroots mobilisation and development.

    As an impetus, he said grants-in-aid would soon be given to the CDAs across the state.

    According to him, eight trade associations have been registered as part of efforts to boost trade.

    The Chairman of the House Committee, Mr Jimi Otukoya, lauded the ministry for its efforts aimed at ensuring grassroots development.

    Otukoya urged the ministry to ensure equitable distribution of grants among the CDAs in the state to encourage them to continue to complement the efforts of the state administration in grassroots development.

    NAN

  • Dismiss reports on post-UTME cancellation – Adamu Adamu

    Dismiss reports on post-UTME cancellation – Adamu Adamu

    The Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, has urged higher institutions and the general public to disregard social media reports that he has cancelled Post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination ( Post-UTME ).

    A statement by the Federal Ministry of Education on Wednesday in Abuja directed institutions to carry on with the conduct of the Post-UTME.

    The statement was signed by Mrs Priscilla Ihuoma, Director, Press and Public Relations.

    Ihuoma said that the minister also warned that institutions charging above the stipulated sum of N2000 for the exercise would be sanctioned.

    “The attention of the Minister of Education has been drawn to a news report in the media claiming that the minister had issued a directive to universities to cancel the Post-UTME examinations already scheduled.

    “The statement, according to the report, was issued by Mr. Ben Goong, Deputy Director of Press.

    “The Ministry would like to assert emphatically that the report is completely false and without foundation; Minister therefore urges universities to go ahead with their Post-UTME arrangements as earlier planned.

    “Mr. Goong, who purportedly issued the statement, ceased to be a staff of the Ministry since November, 2016.

    “The attention of the minister has also been drawn to some of the institutions who are charging more than the stipulated N2, 000.’’

    Ihuoma said that the minister viewed it as an act of insubordination and emphatically redirected that every institution that violated the directive would be made to face disciplinary action.

    She said that the minister directed such institutions to refund to the students immediately as Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board ( JAMB ) had been directed to compile list of violators for appropriate sanctions.

    “The ministry also urges the media to always endeavour to crosscheck facts with the relevant officials of the ministry before publication, particularly when such sensitive matters of national importance are involved.”

    NAN

  • Youth obesity increases 10-fold in four decades – UN

    Youth obesity increases 10-fold in four decades – UN

    The number of obese children and adolescents aged five to 19 years worldwide has risen ten fold in the past four decades, a UN – backed study has revealed.

    The World Health Organisation ( WHO ) said in the study that if current trends continued, there would be more obese children and adolescents than those moderately or severely underweight by 2022.

    The study led by Imperial College London and WHO was published in The Lancet, to commemorate the World Obesity Day

    Ms Fiona Bull, Programme Coordinator for Surveillance and Population-based Prevention of Noncommunicable Diseases at WHO, said obesity was a global health crisis.

    Bull said: “These data highlight, remind and reinforce that overweight and obesity is a global health crisis today, and threatens to worsen in coming years unless we start taking drastic action.

    “It looked at body mass index (BMI) from weight and height measurements of nearly 130 million people, including 31.5 million youth aged five to 19.

    “Obesity rates in the world’s children and adolescents increased from less than one per cent – equivalent to five million girls and six million boys – in 1975 to nearly six per cent, or 50 million girls, and nearly eight per cent, or 74 million boys, in 2016.”

    Combined, the number of obese five to 19 year olds rose more than tenfold globally, from 11 million in 1975 to 124 million in 2016 while an additional 213 million were overweight in 2016 but fell below the threshold for obesity.

    “These worrying trends reflect the impact of food marketing and policies across the globe, with healthy nutritious foods too expensive for poor families and communities,” said lead author Majid Ezzati, a professor at Imperial’s School of Public Health.

    Ezzati said that the trend predicts a generation of children and adolescents growing up obese and at greater risk of diseases, like diabetes.

    He stressed the need to make healthy, nutritious food more available at home and school, especially in poor families and communities, as well as the need for regulations and taxes to protect children from unhealthy foods.

    “If post-2000 trends continue, global levels of child and adolescent obesity will surpass those for moderately and severely underweight youth from the same age group by 2022.

    “In 2016, the global number of moderately or severely underweight girls and boys was 75 million and 117 million respectively,” the study found.

    In conjunction with the study, WHO is publishing a summary of the plan that gives countries clear guidance on effective actions to curb childhood and adolescent obesity.

    WHO has also released guidelines calling on frontline healthcare workers to actively identify and manage children who are overweight or obese.

    Bull said “countries should aim particularly to reduce consumption of cheap, ultra-processed, calorie dense, nutrient poor foods.

    “They should also reduce the time children spend on screen-based and sedentary leisure activities by promoting greater participation in physical activity through active recreation and sports,” he said.

    NAN

  • Alarming rise in ‘bush defecation’ in Polytechnic Ibadan

    Alarming rise in ‘bush defecation’ in Polytechnic Ibadan

    It would not be out of place to say that the Polytechnic Ibadan is one of the oldest and foremost polytechnics (academically) in the country today. However, like a rose that have begun to lose its fragrance, the institution is gradually becoming a shadow of itself in so far as its environmental health is concerned.

    As the saying goes – “you can never cheat nature”. It really does not matter whether you are the General Manager or the Gate Man, a teacher or a lawyer, a politician or the common man on the street; when the “E” (excretion) in the popular MR NIGER D comes knocking…YOU MUST OBEY!

    God help you if there are no toilet facilities around you to facilitate your “business”, the bushes around the corners will definitely provide a way of escape for you.

    Lately, there has been an alarming increase in the number of students taking to defecating in bushes due to the dearth in the number of healthy public toilet in the school premises. Are there toilets in the hostels? Yes, there are, but there no toilets in the academic premises that are accessible to the populace.

    Students make use of the bushes around them to do their business; this poses a great threat to them and is detrimental to their health.

    Some very cunny students have devised ways to avoid the “bush” method by pretending to be bank customers and eventually using the toilet facilities. However, the question now is – how long can this continue? For how long are we going to put the health of our students at risk? How long are we going to continue to endanger the lives of our students?

    Students (especially girls) are very susceptible to venereal and skin infections due to unhealthy exposure during excretion in bushes and unkempt toilet facilities.

    This is a clarion call to the management of the Polytechnic Ibadan to begin to place a premium on the health of its students. It is high time they started the process of initiating and creating proper sanitary facilities within the school premises.

    If these acts of defecating in bushes are allowed to continue, it would definitely lead to an outbreak of diseases like cholera etc.

  • Phew! The life of a military child

    Phew! The life of a military child

    Life they say isn’t a bed of roses; such is the narrative of a military child.

    Being raised by a military personnel is definitely not a bed laced with roses but one that has scattered stints of thorns along the way.

    A military person is first a human being; therefore performs all the basic biological expectations of a typical homo sapiens .

    However, the difference between a child raised by a “bloody civilian” and that of a “military personnel”, is in the way they stress and enforce some enduring military tenets like discipline and respect.

    First, let’s examine a few of the challenges faced by the military child. There is the overwhelming likelihood that military children hardly see or interact with their parents. Very often, he or she (that is, the parents) is sent on assignment, sometimes outside the country. This becomes a recurring decimal in the parent-child relationship.

    This creates a gap between the military personnel and his or her family, especially the children. Family moments like regular conversations, outings, picnics etc., that are very important condiments in the making of a healthy family relationship are mostly absent.

    A significant number of military children are restricted to mostly the four walls of their homes; they hardly have the opportunity to freely explore and interact with their immediate environment.

    To them, the voice of their parents is one that triggers feelings of fear and trepidation. You’d see some children run to hiding immediately they hear the voice of their parents.

    At certain stages in the psycho-social development of every child, there is a fierce and urgent need to mingle and form their identities with those of their peers. However, the case seems different for a child of military upbringing; parents are usually strict on their children interesting with their peers.

    God help the boy that misses his way in his juvenile need to woo a military girl-child; that day he would literally smell his brain and will NEVER make such a grave error because the kind of slap and beatings he will freely receive will leave an indelible impression in his consciousness for life.

    Sometimes, you will almost think that your parents are “monitoring spirits” will the excessive phone calls you get when you gain admission into higher institution.

    In all honesty, the kind of trainings – discipline, respect, integrity etc., you get from a military upbringing is totally invaluable.

    It sets the pace for life and living and enables you to be able to easily adapt, thrive and survive in whatever endeavour they find themselves.

    There’s a usual saying that “nothing last forever”, therefore, the circular, predictable and sometimes banal life of a military child will surely come to an end. As time passes, the parents begin to lose those extreme claws of clinching to their wards because they (the children) begin to come of age and become independent adults.

  • Price of local rice drops in Jalingo markets

    Price of local rice drops in Jalingo markets

    The price of local rice has significantly dropped in some major markets in Jalingo, Taraba.

    A survey conducted by the agency on Wednesday at Gadar Bobboji, Kasuwan Bera and Mile Six Markets, shows that the price has significantly decrease.

    A measure of local rice selling between N650 and N750, two to three weeks ago, is now sold between N480 and N550.

    Similarly, a bag of local rice sold between N28, 000 and N30, 000 two to three weeks ago is now selling at between N23, 000 and N24, 000.

    When contacted for comment, the leader of rice sellers at Gadar Bobboji Market, Alhaji Nura Mohammed, attributed the price decrease to availability of the commodity in the market.

    He said that the bumper harvest recorded by farmers in the state had contributed to the increase in supply.

    Mohammed predicted that the price could drop further ahead of the Yuletides if the current supply of rice to the market was sustained.

    NAN however discovered that the price of foreign rice has slightly increased in the markets.

    A measure of foreign rice which costs N950 two weeks ago is now selling at N1, 000, while a 50kg bag of foreign rice has gone up from N18, 500 to N19, 000.

    NAN

  • ‘FG saves N120bn by checking ghost workers, personnel costs’

    ‘FG saves N120bn by checking ghost workers, personnel costs’

    The Federal Government ( FG ) on Tuesday put the cumulative savings from checking the ghost workers’ syndrome through the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System ( IPPIS ) at N120 billion

    Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), Mr Ahmed Idris, said this in Abuja in a presentation on the impact of financial reforms on the Nigerian economy, at the 22nd Annual Conference of Certified National Accountants.

    The three-day conference, with the theme “Sustainable Economic Management in a Recession: Issues, Strategies and Options”, was organised by the Association of National Accountants of Nigeria ( ANAN ).

    Idris said that the savings spanned across 10 years, from April 2007 when IPPIS became operational till date.

    He said the saving was not limited to detecting ghost workers, as excess personnel cost that had been channeled to non-personnel sub-heads by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) were also recovered.

    “From April 2007 when the scheme commenced to date, 459 MDAs have been enrolled with a total number of 310,453 staff.

    “Over N120 billion cumulatively saved as a result of the difference between the amount government would have released to the MDAs based on appropriation, and actual amount released and paid through IPPIS.

    “By the end of this month (October), we expect to make an additional N100 billion savings after the verification and capturing of the Armed Forces,” he said.

    Idris said also that the Treasury Single Account (TSA) had so far saved the government N108.1 billion in account maintenance fees and other charges that would have been paid to banks for managing the accounts of MDAs.

    He said that the TSA had also eliminated the bad practice of operating several accounts by MDAs, therefore making it difficult for MDAs to divert public funds.

    Idris also recalled that the Government Integrated Financial Management Information system (GIFMIS) went live in April, 2012, and as at date, it had over 300 Ministries, Departments and Agencies on the system.

    “GIFMIS has helped government to increase the ability of FGN to undertake central control and monitoring of expenditures and receipts in the MDAs and facilitates access to information on financial and operational performance.

    “It has also helped to improve internal controls to prevent and detect potential and actual fraud.

    “GIFMIS has also strengthened governance and accountability in MDAs through efficient and effective service delivery,” he said.

    Meanwhile the Executive Director of Jos Business School, Mr Ezekiel Gomos, made a presentation on “SMEs as Engine of Economic Development in Nigeria”.

    He said that at present, small businesses were failing due to tough operating environment, including infrastructure, regulation, policy and taxes.

    Gomos said government needed to encourage SMEs by creating business friendly laws, policies and regulations that would stimulate the latent talents that millions of Nigerians were endowed with.

    To make SMEs more viable in the country, he called on the government to promote policies that would favour SMEs rather, than bigger companies.

    “Nigerian SMEs cannot drive economic development in the 21st century with 20th century infrastructure. There is need to develop clusters or industrial parks with basic infrastructure for SMEs.

    “Also, on access to finance, there is need to make the processes and procedures to access finance less cumbersome and complex.

    “We must find innovative solutions to unlock sources of capital, while the need for SME Credit Guarantee Scheme is long overdue,” he said.

    NAN