Ladies and Gentlemen of the press, I welcome you most heartily to the IHVN Campus, which will be commissioned on Tuesday, June 6, 2023. We are becoming convinced day by day that apart from the treatment and support for people living with communicable and non-communicable diseases in Nigeria, curbing the spread of these diseases and emerging ones will become common and easy.
At the Institute of Human Virology Nigeria, we have found through evidence-based research and implementation programs that no country, especially in resource-constrained ones such as Nigeria can combat diseases unless it has the multidisciplinary resources, institutions, and facilities dedicated to providing excellent healthcare delivery services.
The conception, building, and commissioning of the IHVN Campus remain a bold step to providing for our people and beyond the state-of-the-art facilities for high-quality healthcare delivery available in advanced countries where our people run for Medicare.
For over 19 years since our establishment as a non-profit and non-governmental organization, we have been involved in addressing the HIV/AIDS crisis in Nigeria by developing infrastructure for treatment, care, prevention, and support for people living with and affected with HIV/AIDS. We have in the course of time expanded our services to cover other communicable and non-communicable diseases such as Tuberculosis, Malaria, Cancer, COVID-19, and other emerging diseases.
We commenced work in Nigeria in 2004 as an affiliate of the Institute of Human Virology of the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore USA.
The founding members of this Institute were drawn from the Institute of Human Virology in Baltimore with notable, physicians, clinicians, virologists, public health experts, accountants, and administrators such as Professor William Blattner, Professor Alash’le Abimiku, Dr. Patrick Sunday Dakum, Dr. Charles Olelekan Mensah, Dr. John Farley, Dr. John Vertefeuille, and Dr. Abdulsalami Nasidi. In furtherance of sustainability goals, the University of Maryland, Baltimore facilitated the re-incorporation of IHVN in March 2010 as an indigenous, non-governmental organization.
So far, IHVN has provided improved the quality of life of people living with HIV through treatment care and support; empowerment of healthcare workers through training; equipping and strengthening laboratory capacity in-country; increasing access and utilization of basic nutrition services by pregnant and lactating women, adolescent girls and children under five in 9 local government areas of Kano State; contributing in reducing the burden of TB by complementing and accelerating the ongoing activities implemented by the Nigerian government and other implementing partners that it is collaborating with. IHVN is also involved in curbing gender-based violence and support for orphans and vulnerable children.
The cumulative achievements of IHVN in HIV/AIDS programs so include counseling and testing over 15 million individuals for HIV and over 3.7 million pregnant women who have been tested and received results for HIV. Over half a million people have been initiated on anti-retroviral therapy (ART) and more than twenty thousand children have been initiated on ART.
IHVN has also provided TB treatment to more than 49,000 clients. From 2019 – 2022, IHVN has engaged 24,445 private healthcare providers including 497 faith-based organizations, 2,743 private-for-profit organizations, 203 private laboratories, and 14,196 community pharmacies and patent medicine dealerships to provide tuberculosis services. IHVN’s key technical and funding partners include the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
To create an enabling environment to facilitate research activities that bridge international and Nigerian researchers, IHVN in 2015 established IRCE to promote public/private partnerships for quality health services, capacity building, and research in West Africa. Professor Alash’le Abimiku who is the ED of IRCE will speak on this.
Again, to consolidate on the successes achieved so far, the IHVN board which comprises eminent Nigerians and led by distinguished Professor Emeritus Umaru Shehu and management envisioned a campus to house office spaces, laboratories, and training centers. On May 25, 2016, IHVN organized a fund drive/raising dinner to raise 5 billion naira with the support of Access Bank Plc and the Dangote Foundation, which was followed by a groundbreaking event for this 7-story twin tower on November 16, 2016.
The vision of the IHVN Campus is now a reality and we thank numerous organizations, banks, and individuals who generously donated and supported this project. When we were asking for donations and support for this project, the media were there. Now that the IHVN is a reality, we want you to be here also. So, welcome to the IHVN Campus ahead of others who will be witnessing the commissioning on Tuesday.