The Lagos State Government has confirmed the suspected febrile rash illness that claimed the lives of over 20 children in the Otodo-Gbame community in Eti-Osa as measles.

The State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, who made this known at a media briefing admitted that children in that community missed out on routine and mop-up immunisation because the Ministry of Health was not aware of the settlement.

However, Dr. Idris said that mass immunisation of children is currently on-going in the community with health officers educating the people on environmental, food and personal hygiene‎.

“The blood samples from two labs we sent to have confirmed that what we are dealing with actually is measles.

“Not many people knew that the community existed. As at the time we heard it, we heard it late and that when we started the investigation.

“Like we did say the last time when our people went there, we did mass immunisation for measles for the children in that community. We started awareness creation and community sensitisation which are still going on and also doing active case search.

“I want to assure you that we have not recorded any deaths again in that community.

“The cause of this has to be environmental sanitation. It is a slum area and personal hygiene were totally off course. (There was) a lot of public defecation, the water system was contaminated – part of the sample of water recorded a lot of untoward bacteria and organism that make it not portable.

“That is why we said as a state government we must be more proactive now. We are doing a census of all slum areas,” he said.

•Text courtesy of Channel TV. Photo shows Dr. Jide Idris.