KANO – The Minister of Health,
Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu has
said that the federal
Government expended N430
million within the last 10 months
on the control and treatment of Tuberculosis in Nigeria, Professor
Onyebuchi Chukwu who made
the revealation in Kano during
the commissioning of Drug
Resistant Tuberculosis
Treatment Centre , Infectious Disease Hospital in Kano noted
that the collaborative effort by
the two tier Government, and
International donor Agencies is
yielding right dividend. Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu
who was represented by a
Director in the ministry, Mr
Joshua Osibanye stated the
multilateral effort was sequel
to UNO statistics that ranked Nigeria 10th among high TB
burden country globally. The minister said that the World
Health Organization (WHO) 2012
report estimated that no fewer
than 3,491 MDR TB cases
occurred in Nigeria annually,
explaining that MDR-TB is a severe form of TB that are
resistant to the conventional
treatment. According to the minister, “MDR-
TB its more expensive to treat in
a specialized centres like the one
been commissioned today, and it
also takes a longer time for the
treatment to be completed than the ordinary TB”Professor
Onyebuchi Chukwu however
stated that as part of conscious
effort to address the menace of
the MDR-TB, the federal ministry
of Health has established 4 state of the art reference
laboratories and 7 treatment
centres across the country,
adding that “we have also
adopted newest technology for
the diagnosis of drug resistant TB. The minister noted that Kano
centre like few other in the
country is in fulfillment of the
commitment of the Jonathan led
administration in providing
effective health care system to halt and reverse disease burden
in the country and making Nigeria
one of the strongest twentieth
economies in the world through a
healthy workforce. Professor Onyebuchi further
assures that his ministry in
collaboration with donor
partners will continue to provide
the necessary funds and
technical support for the control; of TB and other diseases
of health importance like malaria,
HIV/AIDS and vaccine preventable
diseases for the achievement of
millennium Development Goals by
2015.
www.vanguardngr.com/2012/11/within-ten-moths-fg-spent-over-n400m-on-tb-in-2012-health-minister/

With a biafran as the minister,I remain speechless.