A family initiative of the late Balarabe Goronyo in Kofar Bai, Sokoto sponsored a daylong free medical outreach for 500 patients living with hypertension and diabetes.
The outreach is to provide free drugs, consultations and referrals for beneficiaries.
A spokesperson for the family, Haliru Goronyo, said the family would bear the cost of any referrals, including surgeries for other identified diagnoses like a hernia.
The medical team comprises nurses, haematologists and laboratory scientists.
” There are available drugs for all the targetted beneficiaries, while the family will the further treatment and sugeries of all referral cases, as we have so far gotten some high malaria and two hernia cases,” said Dr Zubairu Abubakar, who leads the team.
The village head of Shiyyar Galadiman Gari in Sokoto North Local Government of the state, Muhammad Bello Sodangi, commended the family for coming to the aid of the less privileged persons in the state through the initiative.
” I am therefore passionately appealing to other wealthy families and privileged members of the society to emulate this laudable initiative .”
The Chairman and Secretary of the Sokoto State Chapter of the Diabetes Association of Nigeria, Muhammad Wakili and Rashida Shehu Ambursa, respectively, commended the family for the gesture.
The duo described diabetes and hypertension as global health challenges, adding, ” no effort aimed at reducing this formidable health burden is too much .”
The family had in 2020 sponsored another free medical outreach that recorded no fewer than 700 persons with various eye ailments, including referrals and surgeries.