From Esther Akaa, Lafia
The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) in Nasarawa State has inaugurated its Health Initiative for Rural Dwellers (HIRD) medical outreach for the first quarter of 2022.
Performing the inauguration on Thursday in Loko, Nasarawa Local Government Area (LGA) of the State, the State Coordinator of the scheme, Mr Abdullahi Jikamshi, said HIRD was a medical outreach under the NYSC Community Development Service (CDS) designed to reach out to rural communities.
According to him, the outreach covers isolated communities, in order to review their medical conditions and provide medical care for the sick in the communities at no cost.
“We visit them at their doorstep and bring along medical personnel, corps medical personnel such as doctors, nurses and pharmacists who listens to them and provide prescription where necessary, some counselling and even at times referrals to medical facilities that can handle ailments we can handle here.
“The medical outreach will be for four days would be carried out in three communities which includes Loko and Ara communities in Nasarawa local government area and Marhai community in Wamba LGA of the state and the target beneficiaries for treatment is between 10,000 to 15,000 patients,” he said.
Jikamshi explained that the medical outreach was a quarterly programme and blamed circumstances beyond the scheme’s control for the late conduct of the first quarter of HIRD in the year.
He described the CDS which is the umbrella programme of the HIRD in the scheme as a fundamental programme of the scheme through which the scheme assists indigents and the less privileged by identifying with them and also provides the platform for active participation in national development.
Jikamshi appreciated the Emir of Loko, Alhaji Abubakar Sabi for mobilising his people to come out for the medical outreach.
He also thanked partners of the scheme for providing medical drugs and other needs for the outreach to be conducted and succeed.
Also speaking, Head of the NYSC Corps medical team, Dr Ado Sanusi said the team’s focus is to offer basic primary care, ranging from consultation, ordering basic medical investigation such as Malaria tests, blood sugar levels, blood pressure checks among others.
“We examine and prescribe the appropriate medication or refer the patient or even give advice depending on the needs of the patient.
“The turnout is really encouraging and I am really happy with that. I appreciate the people for coming out en masse to evaluate their health status. As I speak, the numbers of patients to be seen has already crossed 500 and with I see, we could end up treating about 1500 patients,” he said.
In a remark, Emir of Loko, Alhaji Abubakar Sani expressed joy with the scheme for choosing his domain to inaugurate the first quarter of 2022 HIRD medical outreach, saying it will go a long way assisting his people to evaluate their health status.
He appealed to the NYSC staff and the Corps medical team carrying out the outreach to ensure that every sick indigent of the community are examined.
In an interview with The Voice, one of the beneficiaries, Mr Salihu Mohammed, lauded the initiative, saying if the federal, state and local governments are to also carry such medical outreach, medical challenges or cases would reduce drastically.
“I thank the NYSC immensely for this effort and urge them to continue to sustain it for the benefit of the poor and less privileged,” he said.