COVID-19 has enabled global citizens to hold a greater understanding of the integral role WASH plays in public health, and our lives at large. It has caused policymakers, advocates and donor to review a culture that previously undermined the relationship we all had with WASH and disease prevalence.

The current data sadly shows that Nigeria carries over 20% of our African continent’s NTD burden.

• • Over 134 million Nigerians need treatment for at least one of the five most common NTDs
  • Over 25 million Nigerians need treatment for schistosomiasis
  • Over 45 million Nigerians need treatment for soil-transmitted helminths

Unacceptable WASH and open defecation conditions not only fan the flames of COVID-19 to the point where people cannot adequately wash their hands, but also contribute to many lesser known but pervasive diseases that cause long-term effects on health, like NTDs.

Today, as I welcomed a renewed focus directed at  ‘Breaking the Cycle of Neglect’ with The End Fund and The Economist Intelligence Unit, myself and other leaders advocated to explore the far-reaching impact of a worm-free world.

The focus is very often solely on preventing mortality – and rightly so. But as we work towards changing the cultural and societal behaviours and commitments – or the lack of – towards WASH and the prevalence of NTDs, we need to take a closer look at the effects that NTD has on morbidity, too. Building a better community of practice for a worm free world through infection and infestation prevention and control is essential to maintaining good health and wellbeing for all.

Diseases such as Schistosomiasis, STH and Parasitic Worms, can and must be recognised early and treated effectively – without cost, access or literary competency posing as a barrier. to patients.

Dr. Alicia White’s contributions and the research produced by EIU spotlights the macro-economic impact of ending sickness from parasitic worms in four sub-Saharan countries – notably illustrating that treatment and prevention of parasitic worm infections is transformative – not only for individuals and communities, but can lead to significant economic productivity gains for entire nations.

In my keynote address, I emphasised that diseases such as Schistosomiasis, STH and Parasitic Worms, can and must be recognised early and treated effectively – without cost, access or literary competency posing as a barrier to patients.

As we hone in on the WHO targets for parasitic worms in particular, we must all welcome the renewed evidence for action delivered within the EIU report as a timely reminder that we must remain focused on the core constructs that embody and will soon enable the actualisation of the word ‘end,’ by way of control, elimination of transmission, elimination as a public health problem, and thus, total, long-term eradication.

I believe and continue to demonstrate through my Wellbeing Foundation Africa’s WASH program and outreach, that the solution for combating NTDs starts and ends with WASH – a message that the onset of the global pandemic successfully communicated to members of the NTD community, our global infrastructures, households and public service facilitators.

As we hone in on the WHO targets for parasitic worms in particular, we must all welcome the renewed evidence for action delivered within the EIE report as a timely reminder that we must remain focused on the core constructs that embody and will soon enable the actualisation of the word ‘end,’ by way of control, elimination of transmission, elimination as a public health problem, and thus, total, long-term eradication.

I believe and continue to demonstrate through my Wellbeing Foundation Africa’s WASH program and outreach, that the solution for combating NTDs starts and ends with WASH – a message that the onset of the global pandemic successfully communicated to members of the NTD community, our global infrastructures, households and public service facilitators. The pandemic has caused policymakers, global health advocates and donors to step away from a culture that previously undermined the relationship between WASH and disease prevalence.

A central goal of The Wellbeing Foundation Africa, is to improve health outcomes for women, children, and infants. We are committed to improving and increasing access to WASH in healthcare facilities, schools and communities across Nigeria, in a bid to reduce and eventually eradicate the prevalence of NTDs. 

The WBFA has come a long way from establishing a private sector partnership in 2005 to promote peer-educator mass-action deworming clubs in schools, so we know that local NTD efforts have been around for many years, using a decentralized approach to treat communities. The Nigerian government launched a national plan in 2012 and devoted more domestic financing to simple deworming campaigns which the Wellbeing Foundation Africa believes should receive continuous replenishment and reinforcement to achieve universal community coverage.

We must incorporate WASH into a holistic strategy, if we want to finally end neglected tropical diseases, and integrate our solutions for combating and ending NTDs, to start with improved water, sanitation and hygiene – WASH.Soil-transmitted helminths, schistosomiasis and other parasitic worm infections must be recognised early & treated effectively while improving access to detection strategies in houesholds, healthcare facilities,schools.

Today, the clean hands of WBFA Mamacare360’s team of community centred midwives, in partnership with Unilever Lifebuoy Nigeria and Sight-savers, have the ambitious target of reaching more than two million children at-risk of NTDs, all while improving personal social and health education and hygiene practices for teachers, pupils and their families. 

These school-based demand creation efforts reinforce, in children, their families, households and communities the importance of prioritising WASH interventions, including hand-washing with soap, to deliver a key, and continued driver of behavioral change.

As we build back better, and continue to devise strategic contributions to a global Covid-19 response, the focus must continue to shift from solely categorising treatment as the primary solution, and begin to recognise, that with the magnitude of suffering caused by NTDs, the most effective and far reaching approach will be to simultaneously actualise prevention and the education we all need going forward.

To #EndTheNeglect once and for all, we must continue to centre our understanding of the integral role WASH plays in public health, and our lives at large.