To avert environmental challenge during the raining season, don’t empty your refuse into public drainage – Sanitarian Olufunmi.- Steve Ovirih.
Sanitarian Abiodun Oluronke Olufunmi is the Director of Environmental Health Services, Okitipupa Local Government. She was on our social platform programme ‘the polity roundtable’ on thepolity online TV. In the course of the interview, she drew people’s attention to the environmental hazards of throwing waste in public drainage. She also advised People on COVID-19 and the need to keep a hygienic environment.
Excerpts:
ThePolity.net : What’s your assessment of people’s adherence to hygiene in Okitipupa?
Sanitarian Olufunmi: Well People’s adherence to hygiene here is commendable. There is always room for improvement though. In this Local Government Area, people comply with the environmental sanitation exercise. However, there is still the need to make our people realise that maintaining a clean environment should not be a once in a month exercise. Like the idiom says, cleanliness is next to Godliness, we have to make sure that our environment is clean at all times because it saves us a lot of trouble in the long run. Our people are fond of one habit: emptying their refuse in public drainage. It is a condemnable habit. It is a habit that causes terrible environmental hazard that will end up haunting everybody; we are in another raining season and nobody prays for flood. Therefore to avert another round of very terrible environmental challenge, our people must desist from pouring their waste into the public drainage. Under the Local Government Act, it is an offence to empty your waste in public drainage. Any one who is caught doing this will be arrested and prosecuted. So , we are appealing to our people that doing such amount to complicating environmental challenge. The Council is outsourcing waste management to a private outfit, so rather than turn ourselves to waste disposal officers littering our public drainages with refuse from one end of the town to the other, we should keep our dirt in a tight fitting cover before the final disposal. We charge our people that before the arrival of the private waste management outfit, we should try to maintain a very good hygiene in our homes.
Thepolity.net : What’s your take on COVID-19? Is there any awareness campaign by your unit for the people in the grassroots?
Sanitarian Olufunmi: Thank you very much. The issue of COVID 19 rampaging the whole world calls for the concerted effort of all of us so that we all can together ensure we are safe from this scourge. The Ondo state government and at our level here in Okitipupa Local Government, we have embarked on serious awareness campaign, reaching out to our people at the grassroots with the guidelines and regulations they need to adhere strictly to in order not to contract the deadly virus. We are sensitising our people and we have so far taken the awareness to the door step of our people even in the interior settlement of Okitipupa. We have created awareness about the preventive measures that our people need to know such as regular hand washing, use of alcohol based sanitizer regularly, wearing of face masks when going out , and above all, we have appealed to our people to stay indoor for them to stay safe. The focal point of our awareness campaign is the safety of lives in our community and we have made them realise that the unseen virus ‘corona’ kills. Virtually everybody in the Local Government Area on the bases of our awareness outreach is aware of the dangers of COVID 19 and the safety tips. We have also fumigated public places withing the Local Government Area bearing in mind that fumigation and disinfestation is a step to ensuring a clean environment.
Thepolity.net : What are the challenges Environmental Health workers encounter in the discharge of their duties?
Sanitarian Olufunmi: Well, Ondo state government has sympathy for health workers and the health sector generally, but our “Oliver Twist” asks for more. There are different challenges we encounter ; when we talk of manpower, we have less manpower in the Environmental Health unit. We want the state government to look into this challenge ; of course there is no employment in the state yet, we are imploring government to look into the possibility of employing more personnel in the health sector of the state workforce . As regards working equipment, the government has tried very commendably. In relation to wages and salary, Ondo state government has done creditably well. The state government releases money monthly to take care of the environmental sanitation exercise of each local government area of the state and it goes a long way to ensure the success of the all important monthly exercise. Well, what we are saying here is that Ondo state government has done creditably well, but they can do more for the health sector in terms of recruitment of more workforce and provision of incentives for us.
Thepolity.net : Tell us about your profession. Will you encourage the younger generation to join this profession?
Sanitarian Olufunmi: I will say as Environmental Health officers, gone are the days when we were seen as threat, when we were seen as Public Health Inspectors. Now , there is innovation in my line of career as we have rebranded as Environment Health Practitioners .We are concerned with the sanitation of our environment, the public places and the entire surroundings of our society. The profession is a large body saddled with the responsibility of ensuring the prevention of the occurrence of the outbreak of epidemics in our society. We are to prevent , as we are doing now, the outbreak of viruses like the coronavirus in our environment. Will I encourage the younger generation to join this noble profession? Yes of course I will! In fact, the younger generation are showing interest in the Environmental Health profession as a good number of them are going to school to study Environmental Health. To me, this is a welcome development.
Thepolity.net : Before I let you go ma, I want you to advise our People on Coronavirus disease.
Sanitarian Olufunmi: Thank you very much. Well our people at home, I want you to know that the challenge of COVID 19 is still there. Coronavirus disease is real, very real! We are at the level of the community spread of the virus and the virus kills. We all must bear in mind that we need to stay safe. The World Health Organisation’s safety protocols are still thesame. We should indulge the habit of regular hand washing. We should have and use hand sanitizer; we should always wear nose mask. We should not shake hand for now. If at all we want to greet, the elbow shake is enough for now; no hugging and we should maintain social distancing. We are advised to stay at home except it is extremely important that we go out. Keeping religiously to these safety tips and trusting God, we all shall survive the scourge of Coronavirus.
Thepolity.net: I want to appreciate you for the quality time on our talk show, “the polity roundtable.”
Sanitarian Olufunmi: Thank you very much!
