BEING THE TEXT OF THE CONCERNED ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH GRADUATES DURING
THE CELEBRATION OF WORLD ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH DAY (WEHD) ON 26TH
SEPTEMBER, 2013 AT THE COLLEGE OF HEALTH TECHNOLOGY, YABA, LAGOS.
We join the rest of the world in
celebrating the World Environmental Health Day (WEHD) with the theme ‘Emerging
Environmental Health Risks and Challenges for Tomorrow. The World Environmental
Health Day (WEHD) was declared by the International Federation of Environmental
Health (IFEH) in 2010 to inculcate and promote the culture of environmental
consciousness and friendliness amongst every age group, children and
adolescents, and to inform and educate the public on the significance of a
clean and healthy environment in the spirit of promoting the adoption of practices
that are environmentally compatible.
Besides the advice of the
International Federation of Environmental Health (IFEH) encouraging the
celebration of World Environmental Health Day (WEHD) worldwide, the increased number
of avoidable undesirable incidents attributable to poor sanitation makes this
celebration compelling and essential.
According to World Health
Organization, Environmental Health addresses all environmental (physical,
chemical and biological) factors external to a person, and all the related
factors impacting behaviors. It encompasses the assessment and control of those
environmental factors that can potentially affect health and its targeted
towards preventing diseases and creation of health-supportive environments.
Environmental Health Risks and
Challenges are wide spread environmental health hazards resulting from inaction
or/and action of man, potentially degenerating environmental media with
attendant long and short term public health effects. Such effects can be
localized, regional or global with serious socio-economic drawbacks.
Therefore, emerging environmental
health risks and challenges are those that are coming into existence because of
changes in the environment, thus increase their prevalence across various
eco-systems.
While most countries especially those in the developing world like
Nigeria are still struggling to address the existing environmental health
problems, new challenges and risks are emerging which require complex
solutions. The causes of these can be traced to:
1.
Advances in technology.
2.
Population growth.
3.
Increase in industrialization.
4.
Climate change.
Lagos State being the most populous in Nigeria with over 18 million
people and the commercial nerve of the federation with huge industrial investments
is expected to experience the following challenges:
Ø
Climate change.
Ø
Pollution of water resources, air and soil.
Ø
Poor sanitation and personal hygiene.
Ø
Epileptic waste management.
Ø
Proliferation of second hand (used) electronic
products.
Ø
Chemical misuse.
Ø
Food poisoning.
Ø
Fouled indoor air/ indoor smoke.
Ø
Sick building syndrome.
Ø
Malaria.
Ø
Flooding.
Ø
Building collapse.
The Governor of Lagos State, His Excellency Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola
(SAN) has however done exceedingly well to ensure environmental sustainability.
Rapid development of Lagos can be traced to the welcoming of ideas from
stakeholders by those at the helms of affairs. We hereby suggest the following
solutions to the aforementioned challenges:
FLOODING
The state government has done commendably well on construction of
roads, drainages and canals. Many existing drainages are mostly accumulated
with silt, with reduced water carrying capacity. This is attributable to
absence of man-hole on concrete drive-in into some estates and communities.
This further disallows willing and well meaning citizens access to carry out
cleanliness and desilting in drainages desirably. Drainage maintenance is
jointly the responsibility of the government and the public. It is therefore
advised that reasonably sized man-hole with removable slabs be provided on
concrete drive-in into estates and communities for easy removal of silt and
rubbish, and ensuring optimum performance of drainages.
INCESSANT BUILDING COLLAPSE
Collapse of houses/building both existing and those under construction
are gradually becoming an epidemicity in Lagos State. The first storey building
in our country is still in Badagry sound and strong. Records of avoidable
building collapse, killing people and damaging properties within the state are
due to deviation from standard practices. To nib this menace in the bud, there
should be a re-introduction of professional synergy amongst the Environmental
Health Officers, Civil Engineers and the
Town Planners to ensure strict adherence to various buildings laws/regulations
and there should be constant monitoring of manufacturers of building materials,
e.g block moulding industries should comply with the standard sand –cement
ratio 1:2 -1:3
LAYING OF WATER PIPES ALONG DRAINAGES
The recent move by the state
government to ensure safe delivery of adequate potable water is well thought
and timely. In attaining this objective, water conduit pipes should be laid
away from drainages and other areas of potential health risks. This will go a
long way in reducing the incidence rate of water borne diseases such as
cholera, poliomyelitis, dysentery, typhoid etc
VACANT/UNDEVELOPED LANDS
Undeveloped lands around the state had encouraged insanitary habits such
as indiscriminate dumping, burning of refuse and open defecation, consequently
reduces the aesthetics of the state. All land owners should therefore be
advised to do proper environmental maintenance of their properties.
SEWAGE DISPOSAL INTO WATER
BODIES
Sewage dislodgers were recently
disallowed from disposing sewage into
water bodies across the state ,this we are sure is not unconnected to increased
cholera incidence rate and its obvious contradiction to the principles of water
sanitation. It will be in order if we infer that there is disequilibrium in the
ecosystem of the affected water bodies ,altering biological activities ,owning
to increased organic matter ,biochemical oxygen demand(BOD),chemical oxygen
demand(COD),turbidity, microorganisms, and reduced dissolved oxygen(DO).While
we advise that status –quo be maintained in sewage disposal due to its
localized nature ,we implore the state government to provide central sewage
treatment plant for safer disposal of sewage.
ROLL BACK MOSQUITO
Mosquito had remained a perennial enemy of the people, we should wage
a very serious war against mosquitoes in Lagos state, we should fall back to
the basis, rolling back malaria had not been effective and in fact it’s not
encompassing, mosquito is also the biological vector for other diseases like
filariasis, dengue fever, yellow fever etc whose management require huge capital from our
limited resources hence there is recourse that the state government should
provide all necessities in altering all the potential breeding sites of
mosquitoes.………
……………………………………………………………………………………… PROLIFERATION
OF USED ELECTRICAL AND ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS
Lagos has the highest ports ,through which copious electrical and
electronic items find their way in, these imported scraps soon end up in
various dumpsites, where they are picked and crudely recycled by scavengers, a
recent research on this by Professor
Osibanjo of the department of chemistry, Olabisi Onabanjo University, explained
that the environmental media(Air, land, water, food) of lagos are laden with
heavy metals such as mercury, cadmium, arsenic, with potential toxicity on
public health .We advise that the state government should not relent in its
campaign in regulating the influx of these electronic junks and mitigating its attendant public
health effects .
RECENT RESETTLEMENT OF SOME
PEOPLE BY THE STATE GOVERNMENT
The recent resettlement by the lagos state government of some people
back to their respective states is a welcoming idea from environmental health
perspective. People without a place of abode pose serious environmental health
risks viz avis open defecation, indiscriminate dumping and burning of refuse, illegal
construction of slums along water courses, of which these activities have been
found to be the causers of emerging environmental health risks and challenges
[RECRUITMENT
It is no longer news that Environmental health challenges are
escalating and every government is preparing for tomorrow by protecting its
territory from deterioration through formulation of relevant environmental
policies. Having best policies in place without provision for practical
implementation is tantamount to having none. Government at all levels are
evidently in dearth of Environmental Health Officers, hence, we advise the
massive recruitment of qualified Environmental Health Officers, who are the
change agents needed in providing and maintaining the desired health-supportive
environment through various actions in detecting public health nuisances via:
·
House-to-house inspection
·
Surveillance of diseases
·
Inspection of water treatment plant
·
Effective waste management
·
Food hygiene and safety
·
Approval of building in line with building
laws/regulation specifications
·
Integrated pest management and many more.
Thanks for listening.
Signed:
JAMES ABRAHAM OLAMILEKAN
BASHORUN NURENI OLADIMEJI
LASISI MURITALA ADEMOLA
AYOADE SAHEED ADELEKE
FRIDAY ISAAH JEREMIAH
WAHAB AREMU JAMIU
AND OTHERS
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