Ike Nnachi, Abakaliki
The Coordinating Minister for Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Ali Pate, has said that President Bola Tinubu’s administration is committed to ensuring qualitative healthcare to all Nigerians especially those at the grassroots.
He made the call during the commissioning and handingover of the Amaewula Cottage Hospital in Ezza North Local Government Area by the the Institute of Genomics and Global Health (IGH).
The Hospital will now be known as Alex Ekwueme Federal University Teaching Hospital Abakaliki (AE-FUTHA) Annex.
The Minister represented by the Chief Epidemiologist of Nigeria, Dr. Ganiyu Jamiyu, said that the project is a government-private sector partnership.
He noted that the present administration is committed to partnering with the private sector to ensure quality healthcare to the rural communities.
“We will continue to support the private sector in keying into the healthcare programmes of the present administration.
“We expect that other organisations and agencies should emulate this gesture of the IGH and begin to look at constructing such hospitals in our rural communities to reduce the incidences of death occasioned by lack of health facilities.
“We are calling on the community to ensure the protection of this facility. The community should own it and ensure that the equipment and others items provided here are not vandalised or looted. They should engage local security to protect and guard the facilities.
“There should also be more sensitisation for people to be aware of what we have here. This cottage hospital is going to save a lot of lives. In cases of emergency, you don’t need to visit the teaching hospital, with this facility, healthcare is already provided to the doorstep of the people.”
Enumerating some of the achievements of President Tinubu in the health sector, Dr. Jamiyu noted that the Ministry has succeed in unlocking the value chain system.
He explainedthat effort is being made to start the production of some of the drugs and commodities that the country imports.
“We want to start manufacturing some of the drugs and commodities we used to import into the country. That would be done in conjunction with the private sector partnership. If possible those commodities that cannot be produced in Nigeria, we ensure that we have a system that will bring down relatively the cost of such drugs.
“At the initial time, there was a sudden rise in cost of drugs but with all these interventions, the prices have started coming down.”
Chief Medical Director of the Hospital, Prof Robinson Onoh, commended the Institute for constructing and donating the health facility to the government.
He urged other private sector players to contribute to the health needs of the rural communities.
“I feel fulfilled that this is happening within my time as the Chief Medical Director of AE-FUTHA where we are expanding not just in clinical services but in infrastructure and in things that will help us save lives.
“From what has been done here today, lives that would have been lost here because of certain sicknesses would be saved. We are going to send our team to this place and they will be available to render clinical services everyday and it will be done in a way that any medical care would be offered here.
“This is commendable that a private sector will just come into a rural community that does not have any hope of such facility and establish a massive hospital. It is not just establishing a hospital but quarters attached to it, bring in internet services and also fully equip the hospital with the state of the art equipment that will help offer optimal clinical care to the rural community.
“This is something that should be learnt by all the different arms of the government. It’s not just building a house and calling it a hospital, you have to equip it, you have to make it very conducive and provide an avenue where healthcare workers will easily relax and also give the healthcare services to the people.
“This is a model that should be adopted in this country Nigeria and should be stepped down to every community. There is the need for healthcare services to start going to the hinterlands. Where people who don’t have what it takes to come to the city could access healthcare. It should be us reaching the people and not the people searching for us; and that way we can change the narrative.
“With what has been done here today, maternal mortality, parental mortality will be reduced and possibly people who would have had major morbidities would not have it.”
He commended the Federal and State governments’ support, adding that with the synergy, every other gap will be filled.
Founder and Director of Institute of Genomics And Global Health, Professor Christian Happi said that they were moved to bring the facility to Amaewula community because of the absence of good water, sanitation and healthcare facilities.
“When my wife came to this community in 2012, there were challenges on the ground. They were finding it hard to find water, the school was really bad. I was surprised that in Nigeria, there are places you can’t get good water, no sanitation and no good schools.
“When I paid a visit here, I was shocked when they showed me where they were getting water, at that time, they were scoping water from the ground. From that moment, I started thinking of what to do.
“When you don’t have water, there is a huge amount of waterborne diseases. There was no medical facility in the community. So we decided to make an intervention that can make a lasting impact on the community.
“We first sank a borehole and demanded for land for a hospital. We decided to build a hospital and not just a hospital but a well equipped hospital that can compete with any teaching hospital.
“We want to change the narrative where people will come from the town to the rural community to access healthcare. What we have here is a state-of-the art facilities. We have all the needed equipment that will cater for the health needs of the people,” he said.
