The Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III, has decried the abuse of cough syrup among youths and urged authorities to intervene to regulate its use.
Abubakar made the call on Friday in Sokoto while addressing the 51st Annual General Meeting and Scientific Conference of Society of Gynecology and Obstetrics of Nigeria (SOGON) tagged,” Caliphate 2017’’.
The Sultan described the conference as timely and urged participants to deliberate on improving women and family health to reduce mortality.
He assured that traditional rulers would continue to promote health policies and work toward protecting the society.
Gov. Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto State said his administration established Healthcare Insurance Scheme to improve primary healthcare delivery, women and children health, as well as support immunization, malaria and other diseases.
He said his administration would establish a Teaching Hospital for the state-owned University, as well as upgrade the School of Nursing and Midwifery, College of Health Sciences and other projects in the health sector.
He commended SOGON for awarding Gov. Ibrahim Geidam of Yobe with Honorary Membership Status of SOGON, “in view of his achievements on healthcare delivery to people of Yobe.”
Gov. Geidam described the award as stimulus on him to improve health care delivery.
He said he would sustain and ensure free antenatal and post natal care, accident victims treatment, construction of specialist hospitals, renovation of general hospitals and equipping them with modern tools.
Geidam revealed that his administration facilitated the establishment of the 250 bed space Yobe State University Teaching Hospital Damaturu, sponsored 600 medical students and placed them on salary GL 07 to support their studies, among others.
The SOGON President, Prof. Brian Adinma, said the society would deliberate on expansion of the health care perceptions toward strengthening the system by professionals.
He said 39 new members were inducted, while awards were for people that distinguished themselves to acknowledge their efforts by communities.
Dr Yakubu Ahmad, the Chief Medical Director of Usmanu Danfodio University Teaching Hospital (UDUTH), Sokoto, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that free treatment and surgeries were offered as conference outreach support.
He said that the objective of the programme was to improve women health, noting that the hospital had more than 1,000 skilled members managing women health and rights at various levels.
The SOGON conference was attended by traditional rulers, political party leaders, state and federal government officials. (NAN)
