Why Bauchi health facilities are overstretched
With over 1,000 primary healthcare centres and 26 secondary health facilities including General Hospitals spread across Bauchi State, the state has enough facilities to meet its needs.
Bauchi State is one of the few states in the country which has achieved the feat of prioritising healthcare by allocating 15% budgetary allocation to the health sector as stipulated in the 2001 Abuja Declaration, where African Union countries pledged to allocate at least 15% of their annual budget to improve the health sector.
Infact Bauchi State raised its budgetary allocation for the health sector from 15% in 2016 to 16% in the 2017 budget in order to provide the needed interventions in the sector.
Governor Abubakar also introduced Five Point Health Agenda with a defined objective and a template to address some critical areas in healthcare delivery, as well as constructed and equipped 19 primary healthcare centres with staff quarters and VIP toilets across the state.
Challenges
However, inspite of these achievements, there are challenges faced by health facilities in the state that still need to be addressed to make healthcare more accessible to the people.
Findings by Daily Trust revealed that most of the healthcare centres suffer from lack of trained healthcare personnel such as doctors, nurses, and midwives among others.
Another major challenge is that there are not enough drugs and other medical consumables in most of the healthcare centres including the General Hospitals.
Infrastructural decay also pervades most of the healthcare centres especially those located in remote areas where the buildings and other facilities are almost abandoned.
The recent directive given by the governor of the state, Mohammed Abdullahi Abubakar to the state Commissioner for Health, Dr Halima Mukaddas to immediately rehabilitate the General Hospital Darazo also brings these challenges to the fore.
The governor gave the directive when he paid an unscheduled visit to the hospital on his way back to Bauchi from Misau where he had paid a condolence visit to the Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Engineer Maikanti Baru who lost his mother some weeks ago.
“It is worrisome that this important medical facility that caters for thousands of people from Darazo Local Government Area and its environs has been left to rot. This administration will not let this continue,” the governor said after inspecting the hospital.
He said healthcare services at the rural areas in the state had been neglected over the years causing a high number of preventable deaths, and promised to change the situation in spite of lean resources available.
A recent medical outreach carried out by the Nigerian Army in Burra, Ningi Local Government Area of Bauchi State also exposed the state of some of the health centers in the state.
The General Hospital in Burra where the medical outreach was conducted was in a very sorry state when our reporter visited the place. It had dilapidated buildings and minute services.
The district head of the community, Alhaji Ya’u Suleman Abubakar said the hospital had been neglected for a long time. He called on Bauchi State government to come to their aid and repair the collapsing hospital.
General Hospital Bayara is far better off compared to other health facilities in the state. Findings revealed that the hospital boasts of 48 nurses and midwives who cater for patients round the clock.
It however does not have an ambulance, and has poor security and power supply.
Primary centres healthcare
When our reporter visited the primary healthcare centre at Bauchi State Staff Low Cost area, he met staff cleaning beds, cupboards, beddings and medical equipment.
The primary health facility lacked enough office accommodation. Most of the staff share offices. Water supply is also a problem at the facility as the only hand pump borehole had broken down for a while.
“The well we are using now was recently rehabilitated by somebody who lives here at the state Low Cost. We also need a perimeter fence for the facility to enhance security because we have had instances where phones belonging to some patients or their relatives were stolen,” a source who pleaded anonymity disclosed.
According to the source, more drugs were also procured by the staff through contributions to complement the one supplied by the government.
He also disclosed that vaccines for routine immunisation as well as medicine for children under five and ante-natal drugs are always in stock at the hospital.
Findings by our reporter at other health facilities at Tashan Babiye and Urban Maternity revealed the general lack of manpower in the health sector in the state.
There are many temporary/casual workers in the state health sector who are not being properly taken care of and this is adversely affecting their performance.
“Permanent staff also need to be motivated through adequate capacity building to equip them with more knowledge regarding handling of disease outbreak and epidemics like Lassa fever, meningitis and others,” a source said.
When contacted about the challenges facing the hospitals and other health facilities in the state, the head of Bauchi State Primary Healthcare Development Agency (BSPHCDA), Ibrahim Gamawa, a pharmacist, said that government was aware of the challenges facing the sector in the state.
He said that the increase in population of Bauchi State due to the high population of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) was the major reason overstretching the state infrastructure especially health facilities and schools.
He however said that the government had put in measures to address the issue squarely.
“On the issue of manpower, Governor Mohammed Abdullahi Abubakar has set up a committee being chaired by the commissioner for health to address it. We are also having a partnership with the European Union to increase our staff strength and build their capacities through training,” he said.
He also informed that the state government had perfected plans to provide a functional primary healthcare facility all the over 300 wards in the state.
Gamawa promised that casual staff that were presently engaged would be considered first for reabsorption into the health sector workforce by the state government.