Adamawa community converts local mosque into a clinic in bid to address healthcare challenges

CITIZENS of the Wuro Ahmadu community near the Gongoshi Grazing Reserve in Mayo-Belwa Local Government Area of Adamawa have turned their only mosque into a clinic in a bid to address the health challenges they face.

Like many of the local governments across Nigeria, Mayo-Belwa Local Government Area lacks basic health facilities such as anti-natal clinics. Wuro Ahmadu is a pastoral community with over 1,000 people and about 20,000 different livestock but there is no clinic or hospital in the area to deal with minor ailments.

Ardo Buba the ward head of the area, said that the decision to turn the mosque into a clinic was come about in a bid to provide primary healthcare services to the community. He appealed to government to assist them with a health facility, drugs and personnel to manage the clinic and look after their people.

“In Wuro Ahmadu village and its surroundings, we have no fewer than 1,000 residents. Severally, if one is sick or a woman is in labour, we have to travel for over an hour before reaching a hospital.

“We are in this painful situation for decades and nobody is willing to assist us. So we now decided to sacrifice our only mosque to a clinic,” Mr Buba said.

He said the village was also in need of a school for their children and standard health facility to reduce deaths and illnesses in the area. On water provision, Mr Buba said a PZ Cussons charity recently sank two solar-powered boreholes that would serve the needs of the community and their animals and handed them over.