ILORIN – The Environmental Health Registration Council of Nigeria (EHORECON) has called for the review of the country’s health policy to encourage preventive health practice.
The council’s Registrar, Mr Augustine Ebisike, made the call on Thursday while speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Ilorin.
He is in Ilorin for education program for registered environmental health officers in the state.
Ebisike observed that the current policy placed premium on curative practice.
He said the call for a change in policy had become imperative as the country was wasting its enormous resources to sustain the curative practice.
The registrar decried the general neglect of preventive health practice by successive administrations, saying the policy had led to the deterioration of environmental health services and practices in the country.
He said that preventive health practice would guarantee better health conditions of the people and rid the environment of mosquitoes and other public pests injurious to human beings, if reviewed.
Ebisike said: “We (Nigeria) have failed to roll back malaria which the profession predicted from the start of the programme due to the emphasis on curative health practice rather than the preventive policy.
“And this has become a serious concern to the profession as diseases like cholera, typhoid, diarrhea and other diseases are not responding to treatment in spite of huge resources being expended on curative diseases programmes.
“The incessant outbreak of diseases such as cholera, diarrhea, Lassa fever and other environmental sanitation diseases in states across the country shows that all is not well with environmental sanitation.”
According to him, government embargo on recruitment of environmental health officers across the country is affecting the enforcement of environmental sanitation laws.
The registrar advised the three tiers of government to lift the ban on recruitment so that qualified health officers could be employed and empowered to contribute to the improvement of environmental sanitation nationwide.
Ebesike said a cleaner and healthier environment would save Nigerians and the country huge funds currently being expended on medical bills. (NAN)