Lassa: Residents warned against proliferation of rats due to unkempt surroundings

The resurgence of Lassa fever in some parts of the country has begun to set Lagos residents on their toes, as residents have been warned to desist from building an environment that will be conducive for rats to thrive.

Lagos, it will be recalled, had its own fair share of the dreaded disease as a hospital in Agbado suburb area of the state was temporarily shut down after a patient in the hospital reportedly succumbed to the fever, whose vector has been revealed to be rats and mice.

But, in a bid to ensure that the state does not record a recurrence of the disease, the sole administrator, Coker Aguda Development Area, Honourable Temitope Yusuf, appealed to all residents in the state to keep their environment clean, in order to be free from both Lassa and malaria fevers, two diseases that are generally known to thrive in unkempt surroundings.

He made the appeal last week, at the LCDA Secretariat, during an awareness campaign he initiated to sensitise residents of Aguda on the prevention and control of Lassa fever.

Yusuf, who described the campaign as the first of its kind in Lagos, said keeping a good environment and not exposing food items to rats’ invasion would save people from being affected by the diseases.

He again reminded residents of the fact that that the urine and saliva of rats could cause Lassa fever, while also stressing that ridding one’s environment of mosquitoes was the best way of eradicating malaria. He, therefore, advised Nigerians not to allow stagnant water to exist in their environment. He also appealed to people to always keep their gutters and drainages clean at all times.