From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa
The Bayelsa government has again countered the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, NCDC, insisting that there is no cholera outbreak in the state.
The Bayelsa State Commissioner for Health, Professor Seiyefa Brisibe, who stated this in a press conference after a tour of health facilities in Yenagoa assured residents that there is no cause for alarm as the state disease surveillance system has been activated.
Brisibe, a professor of family medicine noted that since infectious or communicable diseases are without borders, Bayelsa is ready to confront challenges posed by cholera and ensure that nobody dies in the event of any outbreak.
“Some of us are aware of the recent issues of cholera outbreak where we have some issues of data discrepancies between Bayelsa and the NCDC. We believe that these are things that will be corrected as we have been promised but we are also mid-streaming public health because we know that Bayelsa State is in the endemic belt of tropical diseases such as cholera, yellow fever and others.
“Therefore, we need to be proactive, going forward in a way that we do not get to the point of having data discrepancies at all. And outside that, we have to be proactive and see that Bayelsans are at the forefront of knowing what to do to prevent the adverse effect of an outbreak if at all there is any.
“Luckily, up till yesterday( Thursday) at least we have not had any positive cases of cholera because the classification or what defines someone as having cholera is that the stool will be subjected to a culture and it is when it is positive that we say we have an outbreak. But we don’t have that,” he said.
Brisibe pointed out that with the cholera outbreak in Lagos, Bayelsa is not leaving anything to chance to ensure its system especially the use of rapid detection test instruments is deployed.
“So, we are hopeful that with what we have done we will be in a position that we are not going to lose any life to the outbreak. And for me, that is the most critical and most important thing because we are in the tropics, these are disease entities that we cannot holistically eliminate at this point in time.
“It is for us to build resilient health systems where even when we have this risk we don’t lose lives. The outcomes for those that are infected are perfectly alright.”
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