Governor of Lagos State, Babatunde Raji Fashola, and the Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, yesterday at the opening ceremony of 56th National Council on Health (NCH 56) at Civic Centre, Lagos, listed five steps that must be implemented to the letter to ensure accessible and affordable care for all Nigerians by 2015.
They said five critical success factors that will transform health care delivery in Nigeria include: The provision of adequate human resources for health and the even distribution of same; the institutionalisation of universal health coverage and especially universal health coverage and especially universal and compulsory health insurance; the greater involvement and participation of the private sector.
They also called for increased public spending on health; locl production of affordable essential medicines and commodities; and the institutionalisation of accountability in all facets of health care delivery.
They said Nigeria has recored 40 per cent reduction in under-five mortality in four years from 157 per 1000 live births in 2012; and 35.8 per cent reduction meternal deaths from 545 per 100,000 live briths in 2012; concluded plans to take herbal medicine to medical schools; and set October 1, 2013 deadline for the phase out of old Yellow fever cards.
"Health Sector: Now and Beyond 2015" with sub themes
"Public Health Emergencies" and Mutual Accuntability for Results."
Fashola said: "For me, healthcare is very critical because one primary responsibility of our government is to protect life and property, that is security. Paying attention to healthcare is paying attention to security.
"How do we provide universl coverage for health? We have to do what other societies have done, to enable our people contribute and benefit from health insurance fund. There are about 3,500 health facilities in Lagos including laboratorries and hospitals. Not less than 1,000 are not runing at full capacity because people cannot pay for them.
"Free health care is here to stay but how many people can we reach and what happens to the people between the time they get sick and when we run our free medical ourtreaches?
ABUJA: Training Schedule for Basic Life Support BLS, Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS), Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support ACLS, First Aid, CPR, AED
PORTHARCOURT: Training Schedule for Basic Life Support BLS, Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS), Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support ACLS, First Aid, CPR, AED
LAGOS: Training Schedule for Basic Life Support BLS, Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS), Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support ACLS, First Aid, CPR, AED
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