Approximately one million infants die each year from birth asphyxia, and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is continuing its humanitarian efforts in Nigeria to save those precious lives.
LDS Charities, a humanitarian arm of the Church, recently provided free neo-natal resuscitation training for 65 Nigerian medical personnel in Enugu State, South East Nigeria in collaboration with the National Pediatrics Association of Nigeria (PAN).
The training, which is also known as Helping Babies Breathe (HBB), is intended for doctors, midwives and child-care delivery attendants in local clinics. Its main goal is to reduce child mortality by two-thirds over a fifteen-year period from 1990 to 2015.
During the training, the course director, Elizabeth Disu of the pediatrics department at Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, taught several useful health tips which included proper hand washing, preparing a stable and neat place for resuscitation, having proper tools and making sure the tools are clean.
- LDS Charities and PAN Help Reduce Infant Mortality
- LDS Charities and PAN Help Reduce Infant Mortality
- LDS Charities and PAN Help Reduce Infant Mortality
- LDS Charities and PAN Help Reduce Infant Mortality
- LDS Charities and PAN Help Reduce Infant Mortality
- LDS Charities and PAN Help Reduce Infant Mortality
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Facilitator Debra Whipple, an intensive care nurse from the United States, impressed upon the participants the need to go back and teach others involved in child delivery so that the training will have a ripple effect in their communities.
The HBB program has become an annual event in Nigeria since 2002. LDS Charities has provided funding for U.S. professionals to travel to the country and train more than 20,000 health workers from various Nigerian states, including Lagos, Osun, Edo, Kwara and the Federal Capital Territory.
Other Nigerian officials present were Martins Eziokwu, head of the medical department of Udi Local Government Area headquarters; Obumneme Ezeanosike, the South-East regional coordinator of PAN; and Bonaventure Madu, the Secretary to the LGA Chairman.
LDS Charities was established by the Church in 1996 to enhance Church involvement in relief and development activities throughout the world. The Church sponsors five ongoing global projects to help people become more self-reliant: neonatal resuscitation training, clean water projects, wheelchair distribution, vision treatment and measles vaccinations. These projects are funded by donations from Church members and others.