TheCable

The federal government has inaugurated the neglected tropical diseases water, sanitation, and hygiene (NTD-WASH) dashboard.

Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) are a diverse group of 20 conditions that are mainly prevalent in tropical areas, where they mostly affect impoverished communities and disproportionately affect women and children.

Speaking in Abuja on Wednesday, Nicola Olobio, program manager of trachoma, ministry of health, said the dashboard would provide comprehensive information on progress achieved in combating tropical disease, particularly in hard-to-reach communities.

He said the dashboard would help provide good WASH services in places where the services are very poor.

”We are having an NTDs activities here as an intervention and the essence is to find out its impacts in the communities,” NAN quoted him as saying.

“We incorporated the water sector to carry out interventions and make sure that WASH services are okay and by so doing, it makes elimination easy for us because without WASH you can not eliminate NTDs.

“Behavioral change is a huge challenge because you can not change people’s behaviour and this is why in many states, people still practice open defecation.

“Because it is difficult to change people’s behaviour, we decided to bring in the WASH sector to support us.”

Also speaking, Sunday Isiyaku, the country director, Sightsavers Nigeria, said the dashboard would provide valuable resources for researchers, policymakers and other stakeholders on the impacts of interventions in tackling NTDs.

Isiyaku, represented by Anita Gwom, the organisation’s senior programme manager, also reiterated their commitment to partner with WASH and NTD sectors toward the elimination of NTDs in the country, particularly trachoma.