WaterAid NGO, Trains 40 Health Workers On Infection Prevention, Control In Enugu

Posted by Ignatius Okpara Latest Headlines, News Across Nigeria, News From The State Monday, February 14th, 2022

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – Wateraid Nigeria, in partnership with South Saharan Social Development Organization, (SSDO), a non- governmental body have trained a total of 40 Health workers on infection prevention and Control IPC in Enugu State, South East Nigeria.

The participants drawn from various health facilities in the state, are made up of twenty officers in charge of selected primary Health Care facilities, 14 Heads of Department (HODs) in fourteen local government Areas, 4 Representatives from the State primary Health Care Development Agency, amongst two others.

Speaking during the one day training exercise held weekend in Enugu, WaterAid State Team lead, Mr. Solomon Akpanufot, said his organization is deeply committed to promoting good hygiene in the society, especially as it concerns provision of decent toilet and clean water.

According to him, since inception, WaterAid, has continue to make issues relating to Water, Sanitation and hygiene (WASH) its watch word.

He said: “It’s always better and cheaper to prevent disease rather than cure”, urging the participants to take the training exercise very seriously, so as to take the massage of what they learnt to their respective offices

In his remark, SSDO Head of programmes, Mr. Udochukwu Egwim, who also spoke to Newsmen, said “our organization is collaborating with WaterAid Nigeria in carrying out this training, which is being sponsored under the second phase of the Heineken Africa Foundation project.

He said today, “we are training Health Care workers, giving them a refresher training on infection prevention and Control IPC, which is in line with the current trend of the Covid 19 pandemic.

“We are trying to ensure that everybody in the health sector is focusing on curbing the spread of the Covid pandemic, and we also want to inculcate that in all the Health facilities in the state, because the participants are all Health Staff from selected facilities across the state.

“So, we want the participants to inculcate WASH in their daily activities so as to ensure not just only prevention of Covid 19 pandemic, but other infectious diseases, and that is why we are carrying out this training.” Egwim stated .

“We hope, that at the end of the training, it will give them a better idea of how to prevent the spread of infectious diseases, because we know that the global spread of diseases are always linked to WASH, and how people practice it.

The programs officer however, stressed the need for health workers and members of the public to always imbibe the habit of best hygiene practices.

“So, we hope and believe that after this training, we will begin to experience lower number of people that are visiting the health facilities in our respective locations .

Our Correspondent reports that a Resource person, and Community Health Specialist at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH) Enugu, Dr. Kachy Ugwa, took the participants on several topics as it relates to IPC, such Standard precautions, hand hygiene, understanding disease transmission among others.