Nigeria’s Diphtheria Crisis and the Task Before Pate’s Taskforce, by Lawal Dahiru Mamman
In recent years, Nigeria and other world nations have been afflicted with killer pandemics and ravaging epidemics. These diseases exposed the flaws in healthcare systems, globally.
It however, provided an avenue for robust medicine/drugs manufacturing worldwide, and boosted governments’ preparations for epidemics outbreaks, together with other matters concerning global health security.
In Nigeria, some of the serious health challenges we had recently included the Ebola and COVID-19 outbreaks. There is also Monkeypox which has since been renamed Mpox; Anthrax, and recently Diphtheria, which was first confirmed in July 2023, by the Federal Capital Territory Administration, FCTA, after it claimed the life of a four-year-old in the nation’s capital.
The Director of FCT Public Health Department, Sadiq Abdulrahman, however said that they immediately swung into action by activating their emergency response and collected samples for testing at the National Reference Laboratory in Gaduwa, as well as the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control, NCDC.
But Diphtheria cases have been on the rise, according to the Director General of NCDC, Dr. Ifedayo Adetifa. At a briefing last week, she said the country now has 13,204 reported suspected cases, out of which 8,406 were confirmed from 114 Local Government Areas, LGA, across 18 states and the Federal Capital Territory, FCT.
At the moment, Kano, Yobe, Katsina, Borno, Kaduna and Bauchi are the hardest-hit regions and are said to collectively account for 97 per cent of all confirmed cases (8,406) where 6,202 (73.7 per cent) are seen in children aged 1-14 years.
Kano, Osun, Ondo among other states have since set emergency treatment centres with NGOs complementing their efforts to de-escalate the situation. Save the Children, a children humanitarian organisation, for instance, launched a wide-scale health response to diphtheria in the three most impacted states of Kano, Yobe and Katsina.
A statement from the organisation said its emergency health unit is deploying expert health and supply chain staff to help over-stretched clinics to detect and treat diphtheria cases, and to support mass vaccination campaigns across the worst hit areas, due to the fact that 80 per cent of the confirmed cases have been found to be people who are unvaccinated.
Faton Krasniqi, Save the Children’s Interim Country Director for Nigeria, said: “The entire humanitarian community is alert to the crisis here. We are coordinating closely together and working alongside the Nigerian Ministry of Health to ensure we reach everyone who needs treatment and to contain the spread of the disease.”
As cases continue to grow arithmetically amidst a vaccine shortage, three weeks ago, the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof. Muhammad Ali Pate, constituted an emergency taskforce in order to forestall further spread to other states and bring succour to the populace. The taskforce is to be co-chaired by the Executive Director of the National Primary Health Care Development Agency, NPHCDA, Dr. Faisal Shuaib and the Director General of the NCDC, Dr. Ifedayo Adetifa.
Other members of the taskforce include the Director of Public Health, Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, Dr Anyaike Chukwuma, representatives from the World Health Organisation, WHO, United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, Federal Ministry of Information and the Northern Traditional Leaders Committee, NTLC, on Primary Healthcare Delivery.
The minister was quoted as saying, “There should be massive mobilisation and sensitisation. This is where the NTLC is critical. Our people should be aware of the disease, the dangers inherent in and what they need to do. We must mount a rapid response as our children are returning to school.
Pate also urged the taskforce team to liaise with the Governors of the 14 affected states at the time for counterpart funding, ownership and mass mobilisation, while also noting that UNICEF has procured 1.2 million vials of tetanus-diphtheria vaccine as support to the Federal Government’s response to the outbreak.
UNICEF representative, Dr. Rownak Khan, on his part said, “I want to affirm UNICEF’s unwavering commitment to supporting the government’s comprehensive response to the diphtheria outbreak.
“I’m pleased to announce that UNICEF, on behalf of the government, has procured 1.2 million vials of the tetanus-diphtheria vaccine which has arrived in Nigeria. These will be immediately dispatched to Kano, which is at the heart of this outbreak. Our collective aim is to safeguard the health and future of every child in Nigeria.”
An international organisation, Gavi, the Global Vaccine Alliance, on Wednesday, also pledged its commitment to work closely with the Federal Government in its response to the diphtheria outbreak in the country, after which it commended the efforts of the coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare in establishing an emergency task force to combat the ongoing outbreak.
The organisation said the establishment of the task force is a critical step towards an effective response and Gavi is committed to playing its role as a member of the task force in partnership with all technical and resource partners to support its comprehensive response.
The taskforce, in swinging into action last week disclosed at a press briefing on the update of Diphtheria in Abuja, that the Federal Government is finalising the development of the National Diphtheria Laboratory to conduct preliminary and confirmatory testing of diphtheria in the country.
The NCDC Director General at the event noted that the Federal Ministry of Health through the NCDC and National Primary Health Care Development Agency, and partners has continued to work with the Ministry of Health of affected states to respond to diphtheria outbreaks across different states in the country.
“Last week the national diphtheria taskforce deployed National Rapid Response Teams, NRRT, to Kano, Yobe, Katsina, Bauchi, Borno, Kaduna, Jigawa and Zamfara to support the outbreak response in the State across all pillars. I also want to use this opportunity to thank our partners at the World Bank, the World Health Organisation, the United Nations Children’s Fund, Médecins Sans Frontières, GAVI, and Breakthrough Action Nigeria, amongst others for their continued support of the national response,” he added.
The team also said, “Through the laboratory network, we continue to conduct preliminary and confirmatory testing at sub-national and national levels respectively. Currently, we have 14 laboratories in the Diphtheria Laboratory Network with capacity to support diphtheria testing. Optimisation of five additional laboratories at the subnational is currently ongoing.
“We have conducted training for laboratory personnel at the sub-national level on laboratory diagnostic processes, quality assurance, biosafety and biosecurity procedures, and data management. With the support of our partners, we have been able to conduct refresher training for the deployed National Rapid Response Team laboratory personnel.
“Currently, there is an ongoing installation of laboratory equipment (biosafety cabinets, autoclaves, and incubators) in Kaduna, Katsina and Bauchi states to aid the optimisation of labs in the states. There is also continuous provision of technical support to public health laboratory scientists across States. We are currently finalising the development of the National Diphtheria Laboratory.”
The apt response by the Minister of Health and Social Welfare, and his team is absolutely laudable. Nigerians are hoping that with Prof. Pate’s emergency taskforce already at work, this nightmare called Diphtheria, which has claimed the lives of over 400 citizens, will soon be tackled.
