As part of measures to actualize its vision of improving the life expectancy of residents, the Ogun State Government, in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO), Federal Ministry of Health (FMOH) and Resolve To Save Lives (RTSL), has launched the National Hypertension Control Initiative (NHCI) in the State. 

The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Tomi Coker, during the official launch of the NHCI at the Primary Health Center, Osiele in Odeda Local Government Area of the State, described the rising prevalence of hypertension in the state as alarming, saying it should be of urgent concern to government at all levels.

Coker said that the newly introduced hypertension control initiative will improve the management and control rates of high blood pressure in healthcare facilities in Ogun states.

On her part, the Representative of Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr. U.M Ene-bong , said the NHCI will be scaled up in other states of the country, as part of efforts to address the prevalence of heart diseases amongst others.

She, however, urged the  State government to take ownership and implement the project beyond its lifespan.

In her reaction in the wake of the news making the rounds that two schoolchildren in Abeokuta died from complications occasioned by the deworming drugs, the commissioner said the drugs are in no way poisonous and was administered on her alongside other top government functionaries at the flag-off of the exercise.

She said that the drugs were administered on 249 pupils of the said school out of which two children who lived within the  same compound were said to be stooling and vomiting on getting home.