Leadership (Abuja)
Chika Otuchikere
1 June 2008
Abuja — The United Nations Child Education Fund UNICEF has ruled out Nigeria's chances of meeting the millennium development goal target of 70 per cent population access to sanitation facilities by 2015.
Deputy representative of UNICEF in Nigerian made this observation in an interview in Abuja where he attributed this to the country's large population.
According to Limlim, poor sanitation causes diarrhea and put Nigeria's diarrhea prevalence rate at 18.8 per cent.
He said this had led to high child mortality rate, making it the second killer of children after malaria.
Limlim noted that other diseases linked to high diarrhea prevalence included acute respiratory infection, cholera, polio and others.
"If Nigeria did not meet the target, neither will Africa as a whole meet," he said.
He added that the most important thing to look into was not the targets, but the impact of lack of improvement on sanitation in Nigeria.
The UNICEF deputy representatives said there was an abundant evidence showing the importance of hygienic behaviour in the reduction of sanitation-related sicknesses and deaths.
Limlim said hand washing with soap after defecating and before eating or preparing food was particularly important to reducing diarrhea.
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