Vet World Vol.11 August-2018 Article-7
Research Article
Veterinary World, 11(8): 1059-1063
https://doi.org/10.14202/vetworld.2018.1059-1063
Post-epidemic awareness and knowledge of Lassa fever among residents in affected community in Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria
Background and Aim: An outbreak of Lassa fever occurred in Ibadan with a case fatality rate of 50% in 2012. Awareness creation and sensitization is a known disease prevention and control strategy. An assessment of the awareness level and knowledge of Lassa fever in the affected community and a nearby university community was done to aid the development of effective information, education, and communication (IEC) material adaptable to the affected community.
Materials and Methods: A semi-structured questionnaire was used to obtain the data about awareness and knowledge of Lassa fever from 130 respondents. Descriptive statistics and statistical differences between categorical variables were done using Fisher's exact test at 5% significant level.
Results: Respondents' age was 29.9 ± 10.9 years. Awareness level in the affected and university communities was 42 (65%) and 55 (85%), respectively (p=0.02). The most reported source of awareness was the television and radio (59.8%). Only 33.1% of all respondents had good knowledge of the clinical symptoms. Most (68.5%) of the respondents knew rat as the reservoir: However, 56.9% and 80.0% of respondents from the affected and university communities, respectively, had this knowledge (p=0.01). About one-third (30.0%) of the respondents had good knowledge of preventive measures: 18.5% and 41.5% from affected and university communities, respectively (p=0.01).
Conclusion: Knowledge of respondents on Lassa fever symptoms, reservoir, and preventive measures was low in the affected community; the IEC material was developed to address the knowledge gaps. Awareness was also intensified in the affected community. Keywords: IEC materials, knowledge, Lassa fever, outbreaks.
Keywords: IEC materials, knowledge, Lassa fever, outbreaks.
How to cite this article: Awosanya EJ (2018) Post-epidemic awareness and knowledge of Lassa fever among residents in affected community in Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria, Veterinary World, 11(8): 1059-1063.
Received: 08-03-2018 Accepted: 05-07-2018 Published online: 04-08-2018
Corresponding author: E. J. Awosanya E-mail: emmafisayo@yahoo.com
DOI: 10.14202/vetworld.2018.1059-1063
Copyright: Awosanya, et al. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http:// creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.