The Executive Director, Niger P r i m a r y H e a l t h c a r e Development Agency, Dr
Ibrahim Dangana, revealed that the state has 1,320 healthcare facilities. Dangana said that each local government has a focal facility the community depends on. “The Primary Healthcare Development Agency has three main categories of health facilities namely the Primary H e a l t h c a r e C e n t r e s ,Healthcare Clinics and the Health Post. “We hope to improve the state of the facilities by improving the infrastructure and reequipping
them” he said He stated that the agency would continue to create awareness about the facility through the media.
The executive director stressed the need for patients to visit hospitals for proper
diagnosis of their ailments and f o r p r o p e r t r e a t m e n t .
However, Mr Nambol Daniel, the Chairman, Plateau House of Assembly Committee on
Health, says the state does not have Primary Health Care Centres but posts and clinics.
He described the situation as unfortunate, while rating the health care services of the
posts and clinics as poor. He told NAN that “primary healthcare centres are the facilities that should provide basic health services at the community level, but Plateau does not have any. “What we have are Primary Health Care Posts and Clinics, but ideally, what we are supposed to have are Primary Health Care Centres because they are more advanced.
“At the post, you have a minimum package service such as the treatment of m a l a r i a , p n e u m o n i a , diarrhoea, ante natal services
and routine immunisation. “The clinic offers increased services and should have a nurse, a pharmacist and a medical lab scientist.“The Primary Health Care Centre, which is the most advanced, is supposed to have a medical doctor and services like C e s a r e a n S e c t i o n appendectomy, liver function test and so on; sadly, even some general hospitals don’t have medical doctors.
”The chairman said that in the 532 state and federal wards, the state has just over 1000
health posts and clinics, with only 400 functioning. He regretted that the 400 still did not have adequate p e r s o n n e l , e q u i p m e n t , infrastructure and health commodities, among others. “We have over a thousand primary health care posts and clinics but just about 400 are f u n c t i o n a l , n o t r e a l l y functioning as they should. “Personnel are grossly i n a d e q u a t e , C O V I D – 1 9 exposed the lack of personnel on ground, the infrastructure are dilapidated, availability and accessibility of health commodities a problem. “There are some drugs that are not supposed to be kept in a room temperature but because there are no refrigerators in these centres, they are stored inappropriately,” he said. The lawmaker scored primary health care service in the state at three over 10, stating it as grossly below standard.