Jonathan to launch saving one million lives scheme

Nigeria records three new polio cases

BARRING last minutes hitches, President Goodluck Jonathan will tomorrow launch Nigeria’s Saving One Million Lives Initiative, which targets securing the lives of six million women and children in the next six years.

Also, Nigeria has reported three new cases of Wild Polio Virus (WPV) in the past week, two type 1 (WPV1s) from Katsina and one WPV1 from Kano, bringing the total number of cases for 2012 to 93.

According to the latest edition of the Weekly Polio Update published by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), one of the cases in Katsina is the most recent in the country and had onset of paralysis on September 12, 2012.

The GPEI report reads: “A Subnational Immunisation Plus Days (IPDs) in 11 high-risk states in the north were conducted penultimate week (October 6 to 9), and the activity will be followed by a further campaign in 219 high-risk wards on October 27 to 30 using bivalent Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV).

Speaking at the International Conference on Essential and Life-saving Commodities for Women and Children in Abuja, Minister of State for Health, Dr. Muhammed Ali Pate, stressed that the scheme was part of the UN Commission on Life Saving Commodities, which aims to save the lives of 16 million women and children by 2015.

He said: “It is important that the health, education, and reproductive health of these 60 per cent must be at the centre of the agenda.”

President Jonathan co-chairs the UN Commission on Essential and Life-saving Commodities with the Prime Minister of Norway, H.E Jens Stoltenberg.

He said: “Domestically, Nigeria is demonstrating its commitment to this by setting up an initiative to save lives of women and children. The President will therefore on this occasion launch Nigeria’s Saving One Million Lives Initiative. This is part of his desires to save women from preventable diseases, which he reinforced in the 2013 budget”.

The Commission also said that it had identified and endorsed an initial list of 13 overlooked life-saving commodities, which if widely accessed and properly utilised could save the lives of more than six million women and children.