Tomorrow Nigeria will be fifty years sinceindependence but it remains
debatable whether the nation has taken purposeful strides in all fields of human
development. Poverty, health, education and food security are all still key areas
of the economy in need of quantum leaps to provide renewed hope for the
populace and a pride of place in the comity of nations. The giant of Africa is
still a net importer of almost about everything from food items, to finished
manufactured goods and unable to beneficiate its natural endowments for
increased foreign exchange. Education, the tool that should prove most potent in
significantly reducing the time to reach economic liberation has not fared any
better nor has health which just about every Nigerian believes should be equated
to wealth. The media and social gatherings are awash with the adage that health
is wealth and seemingly little or no attention is paid to this all important sector.
A cursory look at the budgetary allocation to education, health and agriculture
will clearly reveal where government’s priorities lie.
Among the public health concerns of Nigerians are infectious diseases.
Although governments at all levels have vaunted on achieving health for all by
2000, 2010, 2015 etc., our public health challenges e.g. HIV/AIDS,
poliomyelitis, cholera, malaria, river blindness and until most recently, Guinea
worm continue to ravage our people, debilitate them and cause morbidity
including incalculable losses and limitations to the nation’s economic potentials.
Today’s lecture would seek to draw attention yet again and for the umpteenth
3
time to three infectious diseases of urgent national importance namely, malaria,
lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis) and onchocerciasis (River blindness). All
three diseases are transmitted by blood sucking insects which are the subject of
today’s lecture. It is also hoped that the media’s partnership with the academia,
would help drum this lecture to our governmental/political leadership. I have
taken pains to invite the local, state, and national leaders with the potential to
influence decisions for positive change to this lecture and also the Non
Governmental Development Organizations (NGDOs). I have chosen to dwell on
these three firstly, because they are topical currently in our country. Secondly,
because they rank among the major causes of death or disability and morbidity
in the populace and lastly, because I have invested a considerable amount of my
adult life researching on either the disease or the vectors, including the
transmission, education and control (waging war on them) over the last 24
years