Prioritizing Primary Health Care
Look at this young man, it's been more than 7 years he started working on health intervention through the Lagos State Health Volunteering Scheme.
Since 2013, I have been privileged to work as a triaging officer, Volunteer Medical Record officer at a Primary Health Centre (PHC), after which I moved to an International agency to work as an operation manager and now a consultant. That’s how the journey started and I started showing up to learn more about the health sector.
In the last three years, I have great privilege to work with public health experts in implementation of health intervention in Lagos State in more than 100 PHCs, working with stakeholders, policy makers, health workers, community leader's and government.
Through the intervention I have which was focus on Pro poor Community and creating access to health care for people who live in hard-to-reach settlement I became more passionate about finding solutions to problem in health care and how to sustain projects that are helping the country change the narrative of the health care system.
Covid-19 however exposed the gaps in our health care system and it is so sad that we are still far from achieving the Universal Health Coverage in Nigeria, I remembered WHO ranking Nigeria 187 out of 193 countries in year 2000, a very poor performance for a country with population of over 200 million and 30, 000 health facilities which most times people described as dead centres.
Last two months has been quite interesting for me as a research assistant in an ongoing survey on assessment of impact of Covid-19 on routine Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Services in Lagos State. With my interaction with patients at Primary and Secondary care level and observing the health facilities staff and services, I feel sorry for my dear country and can't stop thinking how do we get it right and strengthen the health care system.
Health Care is very expensive, which is one reason government need to take a very bold step and political will to address the issues surrounding the infrastructure deficiency, capacity building, recruitment, decent welfare and security of both health workers and patient's amongst others serious issues in the health sector.
May I also encourage us as citizens of the country to routinely visit our health facilities even if you don't have anything to do there, we need to start documenting and taking note of needs of the health care system and have a form of discussion with people we voted to represent us and challenge them to prioritize this sector.
Lastly, Lagos State Maternal Newborn Child Health Week (MNCHW) is ongoing from 5th October 2020, the main objective of MNCHW is to reduce morbidity and mortality in mothers and children less than 5 years of age in Nigeria, the specific objectives include to ensure access by mothers and children 0-59 months to: routine immunization as scheduled, and for missed opportunities; mobilize the community and create demand for routine services; ensure that at least 80% of children 0-59 months are given Vitamin A every 6 months; deworm children 12-59 months every 6 months in the target LGAs; screen for acute malnutrition in children; 0-59months and appropriate referral when malnourished; provide focused ANC – Iron-Folate, SP for pregnant women, HIV Counseling and Testing (HCT); distribute LLINs to pregnant, lactating women and under-five children; provide health education on key household practices. Find your way to any PHCs near you to enjoy this benefits throughout this week.
#SDGs3
#UHC2030
#GoodHealthForAll
#GoodHealthAndWellBeing
