About one year after the 2018 budget was signed into law, 14 states in Nigeria are yet to register for the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF) to enable them access N55.15 billion for the primary health care.
The states include Kebbi, Jigawa, Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Gombe, Rivers, Borno, Zamfara, Ondo, Benue, Taraba, Nasarawa, Ogun and Sokoto.
The development comes as the Nigerian government has disclosed that only two hospitals in the country have two cancer machines. They include the National Hospital Abuja and the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH).
Health Minister, Isaac Adewole, stated this when he appeared before the Senate on Tuesday.
Adewole’s appearance followed a resolution in the Senate on May 8 on the deteriorating state of teaching hospitals in the country.
President Muhammadu Buhari had in June 20 signed the 2019 budget into law.
The National Assembly had earmarked the sum of N55.15 billion in the 2018 budget as 1% of the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF) for the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF).
Health experts have lauded the National Assembly’s approval of the BHCPF in the 2018 Appropriation Act.
It is believed that this would deliver basic health care services to all Nigerians through the primary health system.
While disclosing that 22 states have so far registered for the BHCPF, the Minister listed the requirements for accessing the funds to include presence of state health care development agency, state health insurance scheme and counterpart fund of N100 million.
He said he had also used the Nigeria Governors Forum and had personal interactions with the affected governors on the need to key into the Fund but to no avail.
He lamented that most states have abandoned primary and secondary health care, resulting in overcrowing of tertiary institutions.
According to him, the collapse of primary and secondary health care centres have led to patients visiting tertiary health institutions for ailments like headache, malaria, high blood pressure among others.
He said: “The primary healthcare for the first time in the history of the country will get regular funding. They will get money every month with the head of the community and the head of the facility as signatories. We will reach about 100 million Nigerians with this initiative.
“There will be free ante-natal care, free delivery, free Caesarean Section. They will take care fund of malaria and under five ailments including immunisation, etc. If we able to tackle this we would have solved majority of the problem.
“The states have literarily abandoned primary healthcare such that everything is handled by the Federal Government”.
Nigeria currently has 59 tertiary institutions. The breakdown includes 22 teaching hospitals, 20 Federal Medical Centres and 17 specialist hospitals.
Adewole said epileptic power supply and inadequate water supply are the major challenges of most tertiary institutions in Nigeria.
OWEDE AGBAJILEKE, Abuja
