A firm, Prezzo Shed Investment Ltd, has commenced a nationwide retraining programme for about 200 technicians responsible for the installation, maintenance and servicing of vaccine cold-chain equipment across Nigeria.
The company’s managing director and chief executive officer, Dr Emmanuel Njoku, said the training was designed to strengthen the capacity of the technicians, expose them to emerging technologies and ensure the integrity of vaccines and other medical commodities in the country.
Njoku, who spoke during the training programme in Abuja yesterday, said the company regularly retrains its technicians because of the dynamic nature of technology and the critical role of cold-chain systems in the healthcare sector.
He said, “The purpose of this training is to retrain our technicians across the country because our company is involved in cold-chain maintenance and installation across the country.
“From time to time, we bring our technicians together to train them. Sometimes we do it nationally, while at other times we localise the training to the states.”
According to him, the programme is also aimed at documenting all technicians working with the company, injecting new energy into the team and updating their knowledge of new developments in cold-chain technology.
He further noted the company had developed a range of new products and would use the occasion to launch new vaccine cold-chain equipment, adding that technicians would be trained on how to properly install, manage and deploy the new equipment.
Njoku described Prezzo Shed as a proactive organisation that seeks to remain ahead of developments in the industry rather than merely responding to emerging challenges.
He disclosed that about 200 old and new technicians had been invited to the training from across the 36 states and the 774 local government areas.
He stressed that the company currently maintains more than 30,000 pieces of cold-chain equipment across the country, stressing that the technicians perform a critical role in maintaining vaccine integrity and protecting the health of Nigerian children.
Njoku, however, identified insecurity, poor roads, logistics and the difficulty of travelling to remote communities as some of the major challenges confronting cold-chain maintenance operations.
He said technicians often had to travel to primary healthcare facilities in villages and other hard-to-reach locations where vaccine cold-chain equipment is installed.
“Moving around the country nowadays is not a child’s play. It is a whole lot of challenge travelling around, going to the villages and health facilities.
“What we are doing involves walking to the last mile, which is the healthcare facility. Every village in this country has a primary healthcare facility, and in every primary healthcare facility you have vaccine cold-chain equipment. That is where we go to,” he said.
He stressed the need to continuously motivate technicians who undertake such difficult assignments, noting that their responsibility goes beyond financial compensation.
According to him, technicians must see their work as a service to the country and carry out their responsibilities with commitment and a strong sense of duty.
“It is not just about money. It is your service to the country. This very important service needs to be done with the best of conscience. That is the only way the technician can deliver,” he said.
He added that any breakdown in the cold-chain system could have serious consequences for vaccine availability and effectiveness, stressing that every participant in the cold-chain process had an important role to play.
Njoku explained that the credibility of any cold-chain system begins with the quality of the equipment, but does not end there.
“The quality of the cold-chain equipment is the basic step, but it doesn’t end there. When you have very good cold-chain equipment, then you need other things in the chain.
“You need a very good and efficient provider of last-mile services. If these equipment are produced abroad, shipped to Nigeria and you have people who are not qualified going all over the place installing them, will you have the right outcome? The answer is no,” he said.
He noted that the cold chain was not only about maintaining the required temperature for vaccines and medicines, but also represented a chain of activities and responsibilities involving manufacturers, ports, transportation providers, distributors, installers, technicians and healthcare workers.
Njoku said the company had a commitment to respond to reported equipment breakdowns within 72 hours.
Also speaking, the General Manager of Prezzo Shed Investment Limited, Dr. Albert Ogbonnia Anusi, said the training was aimed at retraining technicians on basic procedures for the installation and maintenance of cold-chain equipment.
Anusi said the company had commenced the programme with an introductory session and was continuing with technical discussions involving its partners.
He said the programme would also feature the formal unveiling of the company’s new cold-chain products and equipment.
Meanwhile, UNICEF Health Specialist Representative, Paschal Bwile, called for stronger collaboration to address the maintenance of cold-chain equipment that had fallen out of warranty.
Bwile said a significant proportion of cold-chain equipment currently out of service were units no longer covered by warranties.
He urged stakeholders to develop a mechanism through which the large pool of technicians could support state-level maintenance teams and improve the operational uptime of out-of-warranty equipment.
Bwile said improving the maintenance of out-of-warranty equipment was critical to ensuring that such equipment remained functional and continued to support effective vaccine storage and delivery.
He further noted that more than 70 per cent of the equipment were from B Medical, adding that a significant proportion of the equipment currently not functioning were B Medical products.
He described the situation as a challenge that stakeholders must collectively address to strengthen Nigeria’s vaccine cold-chain system.
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