To improve healthcare delivery in FG-owned facilities, government has announced special intervention funds
According to the health minister Prof. Isaac Adewole, the Federal Government’s special intervention are for funds for Tertiary and Specialists Hospitals. He announced this at the opening ceremony of the National Executive Council Meeting of National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD), in Abuja.
Prof. Adewole said that each teaching hospital would get the sum of N300 Million, Federal Medical Centres N120 Million, while each fistula centre and specialists hospital would receive N120 Million each to improve healthcare delivery in the facilities.
He noted that beyond the intervention in the federal facilities, the federal government would also make special intervention at hospitals in each of the six geopolitical zones in the country.
‘’ In our 2018 budget proposal we plan to install a chemotherapy centre in all federal health facilities and the government is building capacity for surgical oncology across the country’’
‘’Each of the centres will have a capacity for either cardiac or renal cancer treatment but Maiduguri has opted for trauma centre in addition to cardiac or renal’’
‘’As we move on, things will get better for the hospitals offering more opportunities for training,’’ he said.
The Minister expressed the need for health professionals to join politics to improve their working condition and health facilities
‘’ The more doctors we have at the National and State Assemblies and as State Governors the better for Nigeria’s health system,’’ Prof. Adewole said.
‘’ At the Senate Committee on Health there is one doctor, and there is no harm in having more than two doctors in such committee to make a change, ’he said.
In his welcome address, the National President of NARD, Dr. Ogechukwu Chinka, said the meeting was critical because it would provide an avenue for the key stakeholders to harmonise ideas on funding the health sector. He also urged the resident doctors and other healthcare professionals to encourage good inter- professional relationship.
In his goodwill message, The National Coordinator/ Chief Executive Officer, Nigerian Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu, said the centre had produced guidelines for the prevention and control of haemorrhagic fevers, adding that the NARD members should work with their hospitals’ Chief medical directors to address outbreaks in the country.