The Centre for Diseases Control and Prevention in partnership with the Centre for Integrated Health Programs on Friday sensitised and tested 248 pregnant women and others for HIV virus.

The programme was held to implement the Baby Shower toolkit in congregational settings for the Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission of HIV unveiled in Lagos recently.

Beneficiaries were given hospital child delivery packs at the programme held at the Ilupeju Central Mosque in Lagos

During an interview, Prevention Branch Chief, CDC, Nigeria, Dr Timothy Efuntoye, said that the aim of the programme was to achieve free transmission of HIV from pregnant women to their unborn children.

Mr Efuntoye stated that the health programme centres embarked on an adaptation of the Baby Shower toolkit into a Muslim dominated setting. .

“This is part of the activities to mark the baby shower toolkit which was launched on Wednesday. For the very first time, we are deploying what was adapted in this Muslim community to sensitise women and also provide them with tests and education on how to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV,” he said.

As part of sustainability of the programme, the CDC official said that major gate keepers for the programme had been engaged and they included the Chief Imam of Lagos State and good spirited individuals among the congregation for support.

Mr Efuntoye noted that CIHP would also engage multilateral agencies within Lagos State and the state government to provide some of the basic supplies that would help to sustain the programme.

According to him, this will help every woman to do her HIV screening and know her status before delivery.

Director for Clinical Services, CIHP, Dr Francis Ogirima, said that the launch of the baby shower toolkit was to unveil a document that standardised the approach, while the programme at the religious centre was to domesticate the approach.

Mr Ogirima explained that the baby shower was actually an approach that leveraged congregational settings including the mosque, church and traditional worship centres.

According to him, the programme which started years ago began with the churches, hence, the need to also extend it to the mosques to capture the Islamic worshippers.

“What we do as health programme centres is to leverage on those settings where they already go to for faith information to provide them with additional health information. This is to ensure that the Muslim women are also reached with critical heath services.

“Today, we are at the mosque; tomorrow we can be in the church and subsequent days in the traditional centres,” he said.

Mr Ogirima advised religious leaders and traditional health services providers to encourage their congregations to access antenatal care services as much as possible.

He noted that the baby shower was not a substitute to going to the hospital, but collaboration with the Lagos State Ministry of Health, and the Lagos State AIDS Control Agency to refer them to the appropriate healthcare facilities.

Resident cleric of Ilupeju Central Mosque, Ibrahim Muhammad, lauded CHIP and CDC for organising the programme for the pregnant women, noting that most of them were ignorant of how to contact and also transmit the HIV. .

Mr Muhammadu noted that the information circulated at the programme revealed that “HIV is not a death sentence and we must all know our status and prevent its transmission, especially to the unborn children.”

He pledged to sustain advocacy among the women and also collaborate with other Muslim clerics within the state to continue educating their congregation on the virus.

A beneficiary, Saeedat Balogun, also thanked the organisers for the opportunity, promising to always go for checkups to know her health status and also sensitise her family members and friends to the virus and its preventive measures.

(NAN)