Poor health indices: Gombe gov directs senior officials to supervise immunisation

The high powered committee recently set up by Gombe State Governor, Muhammad Inuwa Yahaya, to ensure adequate coverage of immunisation in all parts of the state, has been inaugurated on Wednesday.

The intergovernmental committee is to be chaired by the Deputy Governor, Dr Manasseh Daniel Jatau, and some other senior government officials to see to it that everything needed to be done to ensure wide coverage of immunisation across the state was done.

While inaugurating two committees expected to strengthen the health system and ensure a departure from the poor health indices, Governor Inuwa Yahaya, said that it was part of the administration’s commitment towards improving the wellbeing of the people of the state through better health services and infrastructural facilities for the socio-economic development of the State.

The first committee, Task Force on Immunisation, under the chairmanship of the State Deputy Governor, Dr Manasseh Daniel Jatau, is expected to ensure that all children in the state are immunised against preventable diseases associated with child morbidity and mortality.

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The other committee, Basic Health Care Provision/ Funds Steering committee, is also expected to ensure the provision of adequate sustainable funding and that will efficiently and equitably reduce and provide quality health care services to the most vulnerable members of the society through the provision of basic minimum package health services and emergency treatment.

While responding on behalf of the committees, State Deputy Governor, Dr Manasseh Daniel Jatau, assured the governor of their readiness to put in their best in the assignment promising that unlike in the past, they would go into every nook and cranny of the state to supervise immunisation activities.

It will be recalled that officials of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) had recently told the governor that the National Demographic Health Survey (NDHS) had shown that the health indices of the state were poor and among the worst in the country.

The Chief of Bauchi Field Office of UNICEF, Bhanu Pathak, had advised the governor to establish a sustainable system for uninterrupted provision of essential health commodities, employ more nurses and midwives to ensure that there is at least one skilled birth attendant in every ward in the State if early deaths must be prevented.

The governor was also told to treat as an emergency, the approval and release of N6 million for the repairs of 30 solar refrigerators in 30 facilities, N300,000 for fixing of shelves in the state’s old cold store as well release N15.1 million for the completion and rehabilitation work on the cold store.

The immediate past governor, Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo, had approved the sum of N15.1 million for the rehabilitation of the dilapidated cold store after several advocacy visits but funds are yet to be released.