THE Delta State Government has reiterated its commitment to ensuring that all pregnant women and children under five years of age in the state have access to free health care services through the instrumentality of the DELT state Contributory Health Scheme.
The Delta State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Mordi Ononye, made this known during the commissioning of the rehabilitated Family Planning Section in three selected health facilities in Oshimili North Local Government Area by The Challenge Initiative (TCI), Nigeria, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
The commissioner commended TCI, Nigeria for partnering with the state government in improving maternal health, through innovative family Planning models, saying that it had the capacity to increase the number of family planning users in the state.
Addressing the pregnant women present at the ante-natal clinic, the health commissioner urged them to adhere strictly to counsels from the health workers on their feeding habits, medications and other instructions on what they ought to observe in order to have safe delivery, saying that government was providing their ante-natal service at no cost to them.
Earlier, the state Programme Coordinator, TCI, Mrs. Nwanne Kalu, thanked the state for embracing the TCI business unusual model which according to her had placed the state the driver’s seat while TCI provides technical assistance from behind the scene.
She stated that Delta State was one of the first five states implementing TCI in Nigeria and that they provided Technical Assistance (TA) to the state Ministry of Health through the Reproductive Health Unit to improve coordination, strengthen health programmes and specifically improve their family planning indices.
Speaking further, she said that with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the initiative was implemented using a three-pronged approach of advocacy, demand generation and service deliver.
According to her, advocacy sought to provide the enabling policy environment for implementation while demand generation aimed at creating demand to drive uptake of Family Planning (FP) services and service delivery aimed at improving access and quality of care provided to FP clients at health facilities.
She said that one of the key deliverables under the Service Delivery Thematic Area was the 72 hours makeover of selected facilities which commenced with the makeover of three facilities namely Ibusa General Hospital, Okpanam Comprehensive Health Centre and Illah Primary Health Centre, all from Oshimili North Local Government Area.
The Programme Coordinator revealed that TCI through the state earmarked 26 health facilities across the state as beneficiaries of the 72 hours makeover saying, “Today we are commissioning the first phase which comprises of three health facilities namely: Government Hospital, Ibusa, Comprehensive Health Centre, Okpanam and Primary Health Care Centre, Illah, all in Oshimili North Local Government Area.”
She said that the ‘Family Planning Unit:72-Hours Clinic Makeover was an idea borne out of passion for improved health reproductive service and work with State Governments in different part of the State.