The National Centre for Disease Control has partnered the Nasarawa State government to commence testing of Lassa fever at the State Infectious Diseases and Research Diagnostic Centre.
Speaking, on Thursday, at an award ceremony for outstanding staff of the Dalhatu Araf Specialist Hospital, Lafia, Chief Medical Director of the hospital, Hassan Ikrama, said the partnership would save lives and help patients to reduce the cost of traveling a long distance before getting tested for Lassa lever.
He said, “The state government has entered into partnership with NCDC to begin collection of blood and testing for Lassa fever at the state research centre.”
“The reason for the partnership is to have a centre that can take samples and run Lassa fever tests. It would reduce the cost of traveling a distance and save the lives of the patients.”
He further said that the Japan Development Agency, through the NCDC, had visited the state research centre, which was currently running COVID-19 tests to ensure that the centre could effectively kick start testing for Lassa fever.
Ikrama explained that the rationale behind the award ceremony was to improve on the service delivery of the hospital and to encourage both the awardees and those not awarded to continue to work hard for the steady growth and progress of the hospital.
He said, “Since the pandemic is now low, we decided to organise the award ceremony in order to appreciate our hardworking and dedicated staff that worked tirelessly in the COVID-19 era, because it was a trying moment for health workers, yet they put in their best to make sure all patients were treated well.”
Earlier, the State Commissioner for Health, Ahmed Baba, assured that the Nasarawa State government would continue to support health workers in the state.
He further said that the awards were given to dedicated staff of the hospital to encourage others to put in their best so that they would benefit from the next batches of awards.
One of the award recipients, Esther Namo, expressed gratitude to the management of the hospital for finding her worthy to be awarded and promised to put in more efforts in delivering on her assignments.
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