By Adekunle Adekoya
When we move forward by a mile, it seems we always do something that will make us take backward steps for 10 miles. And so, it was alarming and distressing to read reports of cholera outbreak in our country again, especially in Lagos, our most sophisticated showpiece of urbanisation. Many have died, and more are hospitalised as a result. I thought we’d heard the last about cholera; I remember the epidemic that raged in our country in the early ‘70s.
No less than six people fell to the cholera epidemic in my little village of Gbawojo, nestled in the forested plains of Ijebu North-East Local Government Area of Ogun State. It was 1971 and I was in primary school in Sagamu, at Wesley School, Oko1. From our school gate we could have glimpses of the courtyard of the Akarigbo’s palace. The Akarigbo of Remoland then was the late Oba Moses Awolesi, Erinwole II.
The government of the Western Region at the time,
led by Brigadier Oluwole Rotimi as military governor, swung into action and
despatched immunisation teams to the schools. I still have the scar from that
immunisation on my left forearm. Many people of my generation in schools at the
time had similar scars and will remember. We defeated cholera then and for a
long time, except sporadic outbreaks, cholera was kept at bay. Until now. Why
couldn’t the public health authorities sustain the actions that kept cholera at
bay? What went wrong that public health officials looked on till an outbreak
started claiming lives?
I know there is a steady influx
of migrants into Lagos on a daily basis, in their thousands. Many of these
migrants get into the city and look for convenient places to berth. These
include places of worship, garbage dumps, uncompleted buildings and other
ungoverned open spaces, like under the bridges. Without access to accommodation
with toilet facilities, these fellow countrymen relieve their bowels openly in
drains and any other place they find convenient. As a result, the entire city
has a problem of open defecation which generates the vectors that carry cholera
germs. The Lagos State Government, and indeed, all state governments have a lot
of work to do in this regard.
Can we now see the connection
between insecurity in one part of the country and disease in another?
A common feature of urban life is street food, and is a global phenomenon. We are no exception. But you will find the presence of government by way of regulation, which seems to be lacking here. What stops public health officials from ensuring that street food preparation adheres to basic procedures of hygiene? Open hearth cooking is a common feature at many of our bus-stops, with flies buzzing items on offer for sale.
In the markets, a visit to the butchers’ section will confound those who
are finicky about what they purchase to eat. Our butchers, recalcitrant,
truculent tradesmen they are, will be seen permanently waving away flies from
the meat on their sales slabs with their knives. Nobody regulates them? It is
my guess that the average housewife will inevitably bring home cutlets of meat with
germs already deposited on them by flies. A family man ends up buying
contaminated food with his own money.
The other leg are those food
sellers. The conditions under which many amala joints prepare their food for
sale are simply unhygienic. Many of them pound yam or turn amala by the
roadside, right next to a drain in which a vagrant might have defecated
overnight. Don’t these people come under the purview of the Public Health
Department for regulation?
As the political authorities find it more and more difficult to deal decisively with insecurity, let Nigerians prepare themselves for the worst. Those of us not killed by bandits and kidnappers and marauding herdsmen may get taken out by the fallouts of insecurity. Add to that incompetence of the power elite when it comes to anticipating problems and fashioning out solutions to them. We are in for a hard, very hard grind.
As I write, I am recovering from a bout of malaria and
typhoid fever. It cost N18,500 to treat. Chicken feed, right? Not until you recall
that similar treatment used to cost under N6,000 not so long ago. The malaria
problem has existed for ages here. Pharmaceutical giants have made billions of
dollars in revenue selling anti-malaria drugs to us. Isn’t there a politician
that can come up with a plan to eradicate malaria? None. They’d rather be
thinking of holidays in exotic destinations with their paramours.
How much will it cost to treat
cholera? I don’t want to find out the hard way, because government is not
present in our lives anymore. It is why we pray so much here, but in other
countries, our prayer points have been taken care of by God-fearing men in
their governments. Here, they don’t fear God. If they do, we won’t be where we
are.
*Adekoya
is a commentator on public issues
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