The penultimate public health advisory by the Nigerian Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development came with a lot of missed feelings and surprises.
The Ministry informed Nigerians to be careful in consuming ‘Ponmo’, a popular delicacy serving the role of pseudo-protein source in many households in the country due to abject penury that has made other protein diets unaffordable.
In the light of Ileya Festival, coming up in a few days, it is pertinent to clearly state that the Ministry of Agriculture failed to hit the nail head on the need for people to observe adequate precautionary measures to ensure that the spread of Anthrax does not result into morbidity and mortality in Nigeria.
As a zoonotic disease, Anthrax’s mode of transmission is mainly from animals to man. Here, the massage should be minimizing human-animal interaction, especially trans-border ones.
Expectedly, we expect the Ministry to make it clear that no animal ( cow, ram, and goat) will be allowed into Nigeria, in the face of an impending health outbreak seen in the neighboring countries.
Contrary to the statement from the Ministry, ‘Ponmo’ may not be the culprit in the spread of Anthrax, as it is just a bye-product. Attention should rather be placed on the consumption of beef and meats from cows, rams, and goats.
There lies the greater tendency to contact and spread of the disease.
With Ileya steering us close by, this advisory seems to arrive at the wrong time. How do we convince Muslims on the health reality of Anthrax without offending religious sensitivity?
Anthrax, together with exorbitant prices of these commodities may not be enough to disallow people observing religion obligation. And of course, animal immunisation is an after-thought now that rate of consumption is expected to be very high.
The Nigerian Protein Deficiency Report 2020 showed more 45% lack daily protein requirement and 70% households experienced protein poverty in Nigeria. These figures are likely to go up due Anthrax outbreak.
The major way out is health authorities to urgent sensitize the populace on signs and symptoms to look out for in animals infected with Anthrax. This should be done in collaboration with heads of every animal markets in the country.
Similarly, jingles and airwaves should be awashed in local languages on impending disaster if not carefully managed with adequate information dissemination.
And lastly, Nigeria needs to have sustainable disease response system and our disaster preparedness must be known to every community as lesson from ravaging COVID 19 seen in the globally few years ago.
MUSA Aliyu
Health Promotion Expert from Ilorin
08038521253
