Personal care giant Unilever Nigeria is making waves in the Nigerian oral health care market with a pledge to reach 10 million children in the fight against gum disease, partnering up with the Nigeria Dental Association to assist its plight.

 Kicking off World’s Oral Health Day, Unilever Nigeria Vice President Robbert-de-Vreede stated that the company has joined forces with the association, and other stakeholders, in a bid to further cement its commitment to strong oral health, and doing business in a sustainable way in the process.

The campaign, which has a theme of ‘It all begins here; healthy mouth, healthy smiles’, will undergo various activities to target children, such as brush day and night campaign to target over 2000 primary schools in Lagos, a health awareness walk, and dental outreaches to rural communities to push the message further afield in more remote areas.

Robbert-de-Vreede said, “’90 percent of the world’s population suffers from oral diseases. When kids are affected by such diseases they may not be able to bear the pain and as such affect them in school or cause them to drop out of school for a period of time.
”In 2014 we initiated the oral health school programme which has so far educated directly 1.8 million Nigerian children on how to imbibe the culture of brushing twice a day. This year we are educating one million children directly on how to take care of their teeth by brushing day and night using fluoride toothpaste such as Pepsodent.
”The 21 days behavioural change programme is part of Unilever’s global oral care social missions to reach one hundred million children by 2020.”