The Enugu State Chairman Committee on Food and Nutrition, Mrs Clara Eze on Thursday urged Nigerians to always eat rightly for healthy living.
Eze gave the advice at a press briefing on awareness creation for the first round of the 2024 Maternal Newborn and Child Health Week.
The chairman, who is the Permanent Secretary, Enugu State Ministry of Budget and Planning as a coordinating ministry for the exercise noted that the harsh economic situation confronting the present mal-nutrition challenge called for families to eat rightly.
She advocated for every family to eat traditional food, thereby, making use of what they have.
Similarly, Dr Uzoamaka Okenwa, Special Adviser to Enugu First Lady, Mrs Nkechiyere Mbah on Gender and Children affairs urged the citizens to avoid junk food for healthy living.
Okenwa said that native foods were more nutritious than the junk food, adding that a well prepared food with vegetables could prevent stunted growth in children.
She noted that healthy food always make one to be healthy, adding that unhealthy nation or state could make individual’s social, physical and spiritual lives unhealthy.
She thanked the members of the committee for their efforts in the exercise.
The Enugu State Commissioner for Health, Prof. Ikechukwu Obi called on everyone to take part in the optimize intervention that would be given to them in their various healthcare facilities in their communities.
He said that there was no volatile area in the state, adding that there were healthcare workers, who were working in those Healthcare facilities.
“The healthcare workers in all the health facilities in the 17 Local Government Areas in the state have been trained to come and do this optimize services.
“The commodities that will be used for the optimize healthcare week have been collected and taken to the health facilities in the 17 LGAs,” he said.
The commissioner urged children and women to go to their various healthcare facilities in their communities and partake in the intervention that the government had joined its partners to make available within the healthcare facilities in their communities.
The Executive Secretary, Enugu State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, Dr Ifeyinwa Ani-Osheku, said that the nutrition status of Enugu has not been encouraging as study of 2018 by the nation’s Nutritional body showed.
She said that any investment in Nutrition was a right step in the right direction, stressing that Nutrition provided key element tht helped the child to fight all killer infections and diseases.
“We are going to use this one week to carry out an outreach in all the nook and crannies of the state, and will provide vitamin A to the children during the week. They will also provide deworming drugs to the children,” she said.
She said that Anemia was also a big health problem as it was a Nutritional deficiency in Women.
The programme is going to be conducted in all the 17 LGAS of the state. Free of charge, urging mothers to endeavour to take their children to health facilities in their communities.
Dr Ngozi Onuorah, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) Nutritional Specialist, Enugu Field Officer
said that 996, 160 children would be targeted particularly for Vitamin A and 840,000 children would be targeted for deworming.
According to her, Vitamin A has the potential to prevent all cause of child mortality by 26 per cent.
“We will use the Maternal Newborn and Child Health Week to increase the number of children that receive Vitamin A and to ensure that no child is left untouched.
“Also, to increase the number of children that receive routine immunizations,” she said.
She said that the one week long would be aimed at increasing the level of services that were provided to increase indices of health and nutrition intervention in the state.
“Over 63 per cent of the children in Enugu have been denied of appropriate eating practices, exclusive breastfeeding, these children are from 6 to 59 months.
“Only 37 per cent of them received minimum acceptable diets,” she said.
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