Chioma Umeha

Tomorrow is the Global Day of Action for Access to Safe and Legal Abortion. Many girls and women are still going through trauma as victims of rape and incest in Nigeria today. The case of the over 200 Chibok girls abducted last April is unimaginable. Yet, they cannot access the right to safe and legal abortion if they have been abused and are pregnant because of restrictions posed by the 1861 Abortion Law. But, experts have advocated that a total health package recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) should be offered to victims of sexual violence, including the abducted girls when they are released. CHIOMA UMEHA (HEALTH EDITOR) writes. L-R: Toyin Aboh, Appolonia Adeyemi, all members of Network of Reproductive Health Journalists in Nigeria (NRHJN) Dr. Nihinlola Mabogunje, Country Director of Ipas in Nigeria and Yinka Shokunbi, National Secretary, NRHJN, during a meeting of the group in Lagos, last weekend. Since the beginning of this week, the media hav

Prostate cancer treatment: What to do about urinary  By: Chioma Umeha One of the side effects of prostate cancer treatment that especially concerns men is urinary incontinence. As treatments for prostate cancer improve, urinary incontinence will become less common.  However, today men should be aware that there are effective ways to alleviate urinary incontinence.  Surgery or radiation therapy may irritate the urethra or bladder or damage the urinary sphincter (muscles that contract to prevent urine from flowing out of the bladder). As a result, some degree of urinary incontinence (inability to control bladder function) is common immediately after prostate cancer treatment. For example, urge incontinence (the strong and sudden need to urinate, followed by a bladder contraction and involuntary loss of urine) is common for a few days after catheter removal in men who have undergone transurethral prostatectomy (TURP) for the treatment of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). 

Guinea worm eradication: Nigeria risks WHO’s certification without surveillance By: Chioma Umeha If Nigerians go to sleep and watch neighbouring countries like Sudan, Ethiopia, Chad, among others, where guinea worm diseases is still prevalent transmit the disease to the country, it may not be certified as a guinea worm free nation by the World Health Organisation, (WHO), come June 2013.  For two decades, beginning from 1988, thousands of volunteers laboured to document every case of the disease and providing the tools and education necessary to defeat it. Nigeria had from December 2008 till date maintained a zero Guinea worm disease case status that is over four years. However, there are indications that some countries are still reporting Guinea worm disease and Nigeria is bordering some of the countries. Last month, the country celebrated her success in the eradication of the disease during the National Guinea Worm Disease Eradication Day. During the occasion, the Minister of

By: Chioma Umeha There is anxiety over Nigeria's preparedness to meet the Global AIDS Response Programme (GARPR) target.   With  barely 18 month  to the GARPR deadline,  fears are rife that the country may miss the target. According to the  GARPR target, 15 million people living with HIV should be treated with antiretroviral (ARVs) drugs. This is because an estimated 1,449,166 still cannot access ARVs after 26 years that AIDS was first reported in the country, even as 3,459,363 people live with HIV (PLWH). This issue may be a big deterrent to the attainment of the 2015 Global AIDS Response Program (GARPR) indicator and target four according to experts. The latest Global AIDS Response Country Progress Report (GARPR) from National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA) shows that Nigeria accounts for 73.4 per cent gap in the number of people receiving antiretroviral therapy in low and middle income countries, by region, from 2002 to 2011. Members of Good Living Initiative

Counterfeit drug: NAFDAC parades 4 more importers - Impounds N59.3m products By: Chioma Umeha National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), has reiterated its effort to ensure zero-tolerance to fake drugs with a breakthrough in the arrest and parade of additional four importers of fast moving counterfeit medicines and products, Thursday, in Lagos.  Announcing what he considered a groundbreaking event during a press briefing, Dr. Paul Orhii, Director General, NAFDAC, said that he is more embarrassed by people dying due to fake drugs than flimsy claims of those described as fake drug abettors on failure of technology in identifying fake products. Parading several counterfeit medicines which the agency seized since the past weeks, Orhii pledged to employ technology and method to stamp out fake drugs and products in the country. The total sum of the counterfeit medicines impounded is N59, 300,000. Among those who were paraded yesterday, b