From Sule Aliyu, Bauchi
The sum of over N1 billion is said to be spent monthly by the Bauchi State Government in its determination to provide quality health care services to the people of the state particularly for Primary Health Care coverage.
The disclosure was made by the state governor, Senator Bala Abdulkadir Muhammad, assuring that the government would soon absorb all the over 2,000 volunteers working in the state Primary Health Care Centers as permanent health workers in the state payroll.
Muhammad said that very soon the state government would free resources and employ them in order to ensure that primary healthcare services was made readily available to the people
Governor Muhammad who stated this while inspecting the Urban Maternity Health Care Center, Azare as well as other health facilities in the state as part of his inspection of all ongoing projects across the state, said that upgrading of primary health care centers in the state is an intervention where the state government has given its counterpart funding to the development partners in order to meet the health needs of the state, particularly women and children.
The governor said that under the State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, the state government is expending more than N1 billion monthly to provide quality primary healthcare services, lamenting however that many of the permanent health staff do not turn up for work while the real workers are the volunteers.
Earlier in his address, the state Commissioner of Health, Dr. Aliyu Muhammad Maigoro said that the Urban Maternity Center is one of the PHCs per ward that the government promised to renovate across the 323 political wards in the state.
He added that the Nigeria State Health Investment Project, (NSHIP) renovated 150 PHCs of the 323 wards in the state, EU-UNICEF renovated 107 PHCs, other donor partners renovated 10 PHCs, while the state government has awarded the contract for the upgrading and construction of 15 PHCs in the state.
