Lagos State Primary Health Care Board, Ministry of Health, Partner WaterAid Nigeria, to Train Health Care Officers in Lagos Six Health Districts on WASHFITs

Yemisi Dada

The Lagos State Primary Health Care Board, LSPHCB, and the Ministry of Health in collaboration with WaterAid Nigeria have trained forty eight Health Care Officers in the six Health Districts across Lagos, on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Facility Improvement Tools Training, WASHFITs.

The three-day training supported by some NGOs including Kimberly Clark and Humanity Family Foundation for Peace and Development, HUFFPED, held at Ikeja, was to build the capacity of healthcare workers to understand and utilize the WASH Facility Improvement tools and to develop a Monitoring and Evaluation system that will addresses organizational needs.

The LSPHCB Disease Control Program Officer, Dr Modinat Akiolu, maintained that access to clean Water, Sanitation and Hygiene, WASH, are essential to the effectiveness of any health care, hence the need to ensure cleanliness at all times to prevent infections and promote public health as well as contribute to social and economic development.

“While taking limited local capacity and resources into consideration. The training will follow a Training of Trainers model,
allowing the participants to cascade to other healthcare workers across the six health districts in Lagos state”

Head of WaterAid Nigeria Lagos Program, Dr Alao Adebayo, stated that the NGO’s investment in WASHFITs especially rehabilitation of two Primary Health Centers in Ojodu and Ikorodu North, is to use it as a model for the Lagos State government to follow suit for a comprehensive and inclusive WASH facility.

Dr Alao, who noted that the training was borne out of evidence-based assessment gaps in Lagos Health sector, challenged the Lagos State government to invest more in WASHFITs infrastructure with a call on participants from the six Health Districts to train other health workers to achieve the desired results of ensuring a cleaner and healthier environment.

Some of the participants commended WaterAid Nigeria for the support and promised to use the knowledge gained from the three days training to foster a collaborative learning environment, empowering other health workers to adapt techniques to their
different audience using data collections and understanding relevant indicators.

The participants went on field work to four different Primary Health Centers in Ikorodu, Ojodu, Ikeja and Surulere for on the spot assessment using the seven WASHFITs indicators which include Water, Sanitation, Health Care waste, Hand Hygiene, Environmental Cleaning, Energy and Environment as well as Management and Workforce.