Lagos Govt To Expand Urban Slum Development To Epe, Amuwo-Odofin

Lagos Slum

The Lagos State Government is set to expand her intervention in urban slum development to Epe and Amuwo-Odofin Local Government Areas as part of efforts to replicate the success of the basic maternal, newborn and child health intervention in Kosofe. The Commissioner for Economic Planning and Budget, Mr. Akinyemi Ashade, who disclosed this while addressing stakeholders on the plans of the government in collaboration with UNICEF to intervene in other areas, stated that the success recorded in Kosofe LGA has brought to the front burner the need to replicate it.

He commended UNICEF for collaborating with the State Government to intervene in the living condition of urban slum dwellers with the aim of improving their degraded environment and providing health and social infrastructure to support healthy living. The Commissioner explained that UNICEF had supported Lagos State to intervene in Kosofe Local Government between June and November, 2015 with N10 million worth of projects targeted at ensuring that 80 per cent of under Five years old children are fully immunized, reduce the number of unimmunized children by at least 30 per cent and treatment of at least 80 per cent of children who had Malaria, Pneumonia and Diarrhoea in the selected Wards by December, 2015. The intervention was also to ensure that 90 per cent of all pregnant women receive Focused Antenatal Care (FANC) including HIV testing, 80 per cent of all babies delivered are exclusively breastfed for the first six months and 70 per cent of all births are registered. Ashade expressed happiness over the outcome of the programme, stating that between June and November, 2015 the intervention had surpassed the target, as the Key Performance Indicators (KPI) showed that over 90 per cent of pregnant women received Focused Antenatal Care including HIV test, over 70 per cent births were registered, 80 per cent of children under five were fully immunized while over 80 per cent of children with malaria, Pneumonia and Diarrhoea had already being treated. The Commissioner therefore appealed to the residents of Kosofe LG to continue to embrace the programme and implored the people of Epe and Amuwo-Odofin whose settlements have been selected to benefit from the next phase of the laudable programme to buy into it, take ownership and spread the information about the programme to all in order for it to be successful. He noted that, “the Lagos State Government believes that our national indices for neonatal (under One month), infants (under One year), under Five years and maternal mortality rates and morbidities must improve and surpass the minimum acceptable standard”. “There is no gainsaying the fact that the well-being of our women and under-five children is one of the most important issues that determine socio-economic growth and development of a nation. It is therefore not acceptable that, many of our women still die from the life-threatening process of childbirth largely because of ignorance through lack of education, and that must change”, he added. Akinyemi promised that the present administration will continue to partner with UNICEF which has been driving the Urban Slum Health Interventions to mitigate the hardships and challenges which overpopulation, degraded environment, absence of development plan and dearth of health infrastructure has created in some parts of Lagos State