The Rotary Foundation has assured of its renewed commitment to reducing the rate of maternal and child deaths in the country.
Chairman of The Rotary Foundation Board of Trustees, Holger Knaack gave the assurance at a Community Dialogue and Medical Outreach organised by Rotary-RMCH in Gwarinpa, Abuja on Thursday.
Knaack informed that his visit to Nigeria was to have a first hand experience on the impact of the Foundation on communities. He noted that the goal of the together for healthy families program was to fight maternal and child death during delivery.
“I want to thank Rotarians here for their great work. And I also want to thank our big donors here, who are supporting this program. And so I would like to thank all Nigerians, all Rotarians from the bottom of my heart to fight against maternal and child death”, he said.
The Chairman hinted that the next program they would embark on was to curb the three top killers of children:
“And our next program, more big, is Rotary Healthy Community Challenge, where teams are going from community to community to fight malaria, diarrhea and pneumonia, the three top killers of children. So these major programs of Rotary International happens here in Nigeria. And that’s the reason why I’m here, to thank Rotarians and all Nigerians to fight against these diseases”, he said.
On polio, Knaack said, “Rotary is taking care of people. That’s why our goal is to eradicate polio, as long as there are single cases in Pakistan and Afghanistan, we have to go on with vaccinating children. Even if we kicked polio out of Africa five years ago.
“But as long as we see a single case in the world, our children are not safe. So all of us has to make sure that no child ever will be crippled again. That’s why we have to continue to vaccinate against polio”.
He also stated that the reason for his visit was to take word back to the donors on the impact their donations were making:
“Another reason why I’m here, to tell people, our donors all over the world, mainly in the United States, North America and Europe, that donating makes sense because our impact is what counts.
On her part, Rotary Foundation Trustee Ijeoma Okoro stated: “We have reduced maternal and child mortality with over 28 percent. And this is our third year in the project. It’s actually our desire that by the time we are done, no mother or no child will perish at that age”.
She continued, “in the developed world, you heard him talk about America and Europe, it’s unheard of that women and children will die out of lack of care, out of things that were not properly done, while those processes were going on. And that is why we are deep in community engagement. To start right from before conception, going through the times of our pregnancy, till the child is born. Even after the child is born, we still follow up till the child is even five years and above. So it is a commitment, we are committed to it. Rotary is committed to it, and Rotary is not looking back”.
Meanwhile, National Coordinator/Country Director of the Together for Healthy Families in Nigeria programme, Prof. Adedolapo Lufadeju, attributed the success of the program to the roles played by traditional leaders. “The role of traditional rulers and our traditional fathers in the program, together for healthy families in Nigeria cannot be overemphasized.
“We cannot go to any community unless we first of all pay homage to the traditional ruler. That is important because people listen to him, they do what he tells them to do because of tradition. Our traditional fathers are very well respected and that is why we go through them. Left to us alone, we can do very little but when we collaborate with them, then we know that we are going to be successful”, he said.
The district head of Gwarinpa, Prince Umar Bayero said, “I am indebted to what the Rotary Club has been doing to my community. I will continue to emphasize that I want to say a big thank you to Rotary Club for coming to and identifying my community for the project they have initiated, including the polio eradication”.
