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As Owaba, Omeire, Others Bag Pfizer Award
University Don, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic), University of Benin, Prof. Ray Ozolua, has won the competitive and highly coveted May & Baker Professional Excellence Service Award in Pharmacy for 2022. He was presented with the award plaque, certificate, and a dummy cheque of N500,000.
In the same vein, the Pfizer Award of Excellence was bagged by five notable pharmacists including Pharm. (Dr) Charles Ronari Owaba; Pharm. (Dr) Moteehat Olubukola Olu-Lawal; Pharm. (Mrs) Clara Yemi Adesola; Pharm. (Dr) Dorcas Nyalas Omeire and Pharm. (Dr) Ekaette Paul Orebiyi.
Prof. Ozolua and the Pfizer Award winners were announced at the closing banquet of the 95th PSN Conference held at Crispan Suites and Event Centre, Jos, Plateau State recently.
A pharmacist, pharmacologist and toxicologist with over twenty years of teaching and research experience, the 2022 May &Baker Award winner started his academic career as a graduate assistant in the Department of Pharmacology & Toxicology, University of Benin, in April 1993. He rose through the ranks to become a Professor in October 2011.
He has served as a consultant to the Federal Ministry of Health, Pharmacists Council of Nigeria, and Partnership for Transforming Health Systems 2 (PATHS-2), Medical Sciences for Health (MSH), and United States Agency for International Development (USAID), among others.
Ozolua is a Fellow of the West African Society for Pharmacology (FWASP), and a Fellow of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria. He actively participates in developing the national policy on Pharmacovigilance, Standard Treatment Guidelines, and Essential Medicine.
Pharm. (Dr) Dorcas Omeire, one of the winners of the Pfizer Award is head of Pharmacy Unit at the University of Lagos Medical Centre.
An ordained Pastor, Omeire was born to a Christian Missionary couple (Rev. Bartholomew Nyalas and Madam Keturah Nyalas) in Adamawa State, Nigeria. She is a seasoned consultant clinical and public health pharmacist, with additional expertise in Substance Use Disorder (SUD) counselling.
She is passionate about impacting and mentoring young people as well as developing capacity and positively touching lives, especially in the evangelical, health and academic sectors.
Dorcas has built a strong network of positive associates and she is blessed with highly supportive mentors, colleagues, friends, family, spouse and children.
Over the years, the May & Baker Professional Service Award in Pharmacy has become a flagship professional award in the pharmaceutical landscape in Nigeria, as it aims to reward excellence and innovation in the practice of Pharmacy in Nigeria.
To qualify for the award, applicants would include relevant evidence of whatever claims they may have concerning their achievements for verification and appear before the award selection committee to clarify some of the claims.
Among other things, the committee scrutinized the credentials for elements of integrity, leadership positions held in pharmacy, academic and professional qualifications, innovations in the area of practice, professional/academic performance, philanthropic activities, and service to humanity outside pharmacy.
Also in recognition of their excellent contributions to the pharmacy profession in Nigeria, the likes of Pharm. Ibrahim Kolawole Bello won Biogeneric Integrity Award; Pharm. Simisola Temidayo Oloye, won BASF Young Female Pharmacist Award; while Mr Santosh Kumar, senior vice-president, West Africa Integrated Commercial Solutions (WWCVL), and Chief Oluwole Awotuyi, managing director and chief executive officer, Tuyil Pharmaceutical Industries Limited, Kwara State, won Friend of Pharmacy Awards.
