Promoters Raise the Alarm as Inflation Bites Harder on Children with Special Needs

Oluchi Chibuzor

Children with Special Needs advocates across the country have raised the alarm that the current rate of inflation in the country is biting harder on the children with special needs across the country.

For them, the cost of living is affecting parents, while several charities are finding it difficult to provide basic medical drugs for the children with special needs in the country.

To help generate funds and bring intervention to some charities, the Worship4Change, a not-for-profit organisation in Nigeria will on 2nd October, 2023, hold a Green Worship musical concert that would see proceeds of about N15 million go to four special needs organisation across the country.

Speaking to journalists in Lagos, yesterday ahead of the concert, the founder, Worship4Change, Wale Adenuga, said more needs to be done to help children with special needs in the country.

According to him, “It got to a stage in my life that I asked myself can I leverage the fame I had to benefit the less privileged children in the society? Some kids have not felt government intervention and so all musical artists are performing for free to raise funds for some charities in the country.”

With 14 top gospel music artists slated for the show, the concert is committed to raising awareness and support for charities that care for orphans, children with special needs and indigent children.

Raising alarm on the impact of inflation on children with special Needs, the  Chief Responsibility Officer, The Lets Cerebral Palsy Kids Learn Foundation, Tobiloba Ajayi, said with inflation their cost of purchasing routine medical drugs for the children went to over 300 percent.

Speaking unbalf of other beneficiaries of the programme from Delta State and Ogun State who spoke virtually, Ajayi lamented the high cost of special needs materials occasioned by inflations.

According to her, “Let me give you a simple example, for a child that used to pay N35000, this September it goes to N61000. Medications that used to be N5000 per bottle are now N35,000, so the cost of supporting them has gone up astronomically and we are just constantly trying to cut costs.

“Even the teaching hospitals, they used to be the cheapest places that few people get help from, now when you are sending a parent in for the first time we need to at least be sending them in with N30,000 for a start. Average parents do not have that amount to put down on medical treatment and that is how inflation is biting harder for children with special needs.”