Sightsavers’ project engages caregivers, treats 36,000 infants in Akwa Ibom

Sarmaan Project, committed to drug administration to reduce child mortality in Nigeria, said it recorded a milestone in its pilot phase with the successful treatment of over 36,000 children with azythromycin drugs to enhance their life expectancy in the Ikono Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State.

It has also engaged caregivers to demonstrate the usefulness of the drugs in the state.

The Project Coordinator, Dr Teyil Wamiyel-Mshella, disclosed this in Uyo while fielding questions from newsmen during the close-out ceremony of the safety and anti-microbial resistance of mass administration of azythromycin to children aged 1-11 months in Ikono LGA on Friday.

Wamiyel-Mshella, who coordinates the project for Sightsavers, an international non-governmental agency, explained that the pilot phase conducted in the LGA was aimed at ensuring that children between the age bracket of 1-11 months receive the drugs under strict monitoring  to ascertain its safety and anti-microbial resistance in children.

“Sarmaan project is a very good project that was introduced in Nigeria in 2020 with a field work and so far, it been very successful. The aim of the project was mainly to ensure that children between 1-11 months in the LGA where we piloted it, will receive acithromycin and along side, we will be monitoring the safety of the medicine and also the anti-microbial resistance for azythromycin.

“Azythromycin is a very good medicine, it’s an antibiotics that is used for the treatment of many ailments that affect children and also contribute to infants to children deaths between  0 to 05 years. So this drug was used mainly to show the effects of it on child survival, that is why we were monitoring the safety of the medicine and it anti-microbial resistance.

“We have been able to treat over 36,000 children in Ikono LGA, and we were able to engage with caregivers for them to know the usefulness of the medicine ,” Wamiyel-Mshella said.

She expressed satisfaction with the level of acceptability of the project in the LGA, and called on the state government to key into it to bridge the infant mortality gap in the state.

In his remarks, the Commissioner for Health, Dr Ekem John who was represented by Dr Etop Antia, Director of Public Health, Ministry of Health, commended all the partners for making the project a success.

Source: Punch