Day UNICEF reminded Nigerians importance of hand washing
Day UNICEF reminded Nigerians importance of hand washing
By Ojo Sola
United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is a well known international organization, aiming at improving common health of people across the globe, particularly, that of children and the needy.
As the world celebrates the global hand washing day, UNICEF was massively involved here in Nigeria. In Kaduna for example, the organization sensitized the people on the need to take their health serious as the basic foundation for wealth making.
It is against this background that UNICEF took the participants on this year’s global handwashing day in Kaduna on highly educative tutorial, at Bugai Local Education Authority (LEA) Primary School in Chikun Local Government Area.
UNICEF reminded us that, “Global Handwashing Day comes less than a month after the United Nations adopted the Sustainable Development Goals, including hygiene for the first time in the global agenda. One of the SDG targets is to achieve ‘access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene’ by 2030.
”Improvements in hygiene must supplement access to water and sanitation, or children will continue to fall victim to easily preventable diseases like diarrhoea.
“Along with drinking water and access to toilets, hygiene – particularly handwashing with soap is the essential third leg of the stool holding up the Goal on water and sanitation,”
Meanwhile, Sole Administrator, Chikun LGA, Kaduna, who was represented by his vice, Bartholomew Shina, thanked UNICEF for selecting Chikun as part of the four LGAs for the take-off of the handwashing project.
He promised to domesticate the idea in the LGA for the health benefit of the people just as he called on the people to make judicious use of the opportunity.
Earlier, Utpal Moitra, Chief of Field Office, UNICEF Kaduna, restated UNICEF’s commitment in supporting the Kaduna State government to improving and promoting water, sanitation and hygiene practices among the people in the state, starting with children.
She said, “regular handwashing with soap after using toilets, after changing children’s nappies and before eating or handling food saves more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention. It can reduce deaths from diarrhea by almost half and deaths from acute respiratory infections by one-quarter.
“UNICEF is on ground to work with Kaduna State government to improve and promote water, sanitation and hygiene practices in three LGAs of Chikun, Kachia and Kubau LGAs”. He added.