Ebola: Nigeria offers recipe for success to ECOWAS

Nigeria at the extraordinary meeting of the Economic Community of West African States’ (ECOWAS) heads of state and government sold its recipe for the successful curbing of the spread of the Ebola epidemic.

This is even as President Goodluck Jonathan stated that the Nigerian government is making all efforts to ensure that Nigeria remains permanently Ebola free.

Speaking at the summit, President Jonathan, who was represented by Vice President Namadi Sambo, said Nigeria was not only looking out for herself but assisting other affected nations in the sub-region to fight the dreaded epidemic.

Nigeria is currently working on

training health workers in the worst affected countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone on fighting the spread of Ebola across their communities.

He said one of the key areas explored by Nigeria in curbing Ebola is the extensive awareness programme embarked upon by the federal, states and local governments.

President Jonathan also said government explored the extensive communication system in the country which includes 120 million mobile phone subscribers and the government reached them directly through mobile awareness.

“There was also unity of purpose amongst all the tiers of government in fighting the virus and Nigerians themselves were also committed by abiding to the instructions on avoiding contacts and reporting cases immediately”, he said.

He also noted that the campaign was championed by the minister of health with daily briefings on the spread of the virus, adding that everyone in the ECOWAS region and in Africa must be committed in fighting the epidemic.

Businessday