Two years after, states await FG’s 10,000 health centres’ project

Two years after the Federal Government promised to revitalise 10,000 primary healthcare centres across the country, many states have said they are still awaiting the central government’s intervention.

The Federal Government had, in 2017, begun the National Primary Healthcare Revitalisation Initiative with the aim of resuscitating over 10,000 health centres across the country.

During the inauguration of the Model Primary Health Care Centre, Kuchigoro in Abuja, the immediate past Minister of Health, Prof Isaac Adewole, had said the target of the scheme was to have at least, a functional health care centre in each ward in the country.

He added that the scheme would be executed through the National Primary Health Care Development Agency.

But stakeholders in different states, including the Nigerian Medical Association branches and chapters of the National Association of Nigerian Nurses and Midwives, told The PUNCH that they had yet to see the impact of the Federal Government’s programme.

The associations and many state governments also said not a single primary healthcare centre had been rehabilitated in their states.

But the NPCDA said the programme had not been abandoned, noting that N5.8bn had been released for the revitalisation project.