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Nigeria is a nation of contradictions—extreme poverty amidst rich natural resources. More than two-thirds of Nigeria's 150 million people live on less than $1 a day. In the midst of economic deprivation and recurring civil strife, families have almost no access to health care. Many men, women and children are forced to rely on traditional medicine and home remedies.
Widespread poverty, malnutrition, poor sanitation and limited access to clean drinking water compound health care issues. Maternal and child health are in crisis with barely a third of all births attended by a health professional. The average life expectancy in Nigeria is only 46 years with violence, lack of prenatal care and shortages of basic medications among the leading causes of preventable death.
Read More About Nigeria:
Medical and Humanitarian Aid
Since 1982, AmeriCares has delivered over $15 million worth of medical aid and humanitarian relief to Nigeria. In response to Nigeria's 2010 cholera outbreak, threatening millions of people with the potentially deadly disease, AmeriCares is supporting medical missions to help stop the spread of the disease across the country and into neighboring Cameroon.
Medical Outreach Program
AmeriCares also donates medical products to qualified U.S. health care professionals who are traveling to Nigeria to provide charitable medical care to some of the country’s most under-served people. Through this program, donated medicines and medical supplies reach impoverished and isolated communities where even basic medical care is inaccessible to the poor or often non-existent.
Since 2005, the program has provided a range of products including specialized surgical supplies, anesthetics and antibiotics to the Earthwide Surgical Foundation’s trips to Nigeria. On a typical trip, volunteer health professionals may treat anywhere from 100 to 500 patients. They perform several surgeries for conditions that are rarely seen in this country, such as goiters and head and neck tumors.
Help AmeriCares save lives in Nigeria and around the world »
Photo: Used under Creative Commons from Joachim Huber / Flickr / CC BY-SA
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AmeriCares is approved by the Internal Revenue Service as a 501 (C) (3) tax-exempt organization, and all donations are tax deductible to the extent provided by law. AmeriCares Federal Identification Number (EIN) is 061008595.