The Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof. Muhammad Pate says ongoing reforms in the health sector were restoring the trust Nigerians lost in the system.
Pate disclosed this at a launch book titled, “Trust Renewal: The Integrity Call for Better Health”, held in Abuja on Tuesday.
Represented by his Special Adviser, Dr. Oritseweyimi Ogbe, the Minister cited reforms like the Basic Healthcare Provision Fund (BHCPF), National Health Insurance,
National Emergency Medical Services and Ambulance System (NEMSAS) as key drivers of acceptance among citizens.
“There’s still a lot of work to be done, but because of that Fund, facilities are now having medicines, facilities are having health workers come to work, and so people are beginning to benefit from those services more and more, particularly under the president”, he said.
The Minister stressed that the number of people visiting government owned facilities had increased from what it used to be:
“The Health Insurance coverage is improving steadily, and there are efforts to be sure that for every person covered, they are genuinely covered and are not ghost coverage by ensuring that they are linked to their need. And so people are now getting coverage, and they’re getting more enlightened about the fact that they can access care at no cost. That, too, is building trust in the system.
“The other thing that’s really building trust in the system is the new but rapidly expanding emergency service, under the Presidential Provision Fund and the Federal Ministry of Health.
“There are now comprehensive emergency centers where women that are in difficulty and need to emergency cesarean session are receiving free emergency cesarean session, including those that have issues of childbirth resulting in fistulas”, he said.
On her part, Special Adviser to the President on Health, Dr. Salma Anas noted that a good health system was not just about provision of the services in terms of infrastructure, human resources, the drugs and all that are required, but for uptake to be meaningful, the citizens must trust what is given to them.
“We are reflecting on the importance of feedback by patients, by clients that visit our health facility. What do they feel, what are their perspectives about health? Because this feedback is not just about complaint, it tells us the truth in terms of the service delivery. It helps us to gain all this information and then deploy them back for improvement and at the same time also know what is working well in the delivery system and then what we can sustain”, she said.
Speaking on the book, she added, “this is a collection of reflections of all our experiences that have been brought together by the author himself, Dr. Abdullahi Mohammed, who is a public health expert who has worked in the field. And then this is a collection and reflection of true experiences and what he has experienced throughout the journey of his work in health care delivery in Nigeria.
“So I recommend this book to everyone, even to our legislators to guide us in terms of how do we improve service delivery, not just looking at the lens of provision of what we desire along the six building blocks, but also what do our patients, our clients truly desire and what are their reflections in terms of what we provide to them to move the health care delivery and strengthen our systems forward”, she said.
Author of the book, Dr. Abdullahi Mohammed who had spent 35 years in the public health sector explained that his book was borne out of many years of experience in health strengthening, adding that he witnessed lots of investments going to human resources, programs and infrastructure which was sadly not translating into improved health outcomes.
“We are doing a lot of programs but if you look at our health outcomes, it hasn’t really improved much. There must be an enabler that is missing. Because of that, I wanted to find what enabler it was. I started a podcast on Trust Renewal and then I started a blog and people were calling. I was having so many information, the information was basically feedback from patients”, he said.
Dr. Mohammed further explained that lack of trust in Nigeria’s health sector has made people resort to medical tourism and other alternatives: “Look at people who are going to medical tourism and people who are also seeking alternative healthcare. Some people don’t even like to go to a hospital; they prefer going traditional and what is fundamental in all most of them is trust. They just don’t believe in the health system and if you ask them why they do not believe in the health system, they tell you it is because of their past experience. Analyzing the background of trust and accountability I just thought it was good to collate those pieces of evidence and then begin to write”, he said.
According to him, weak regulations and weak accountability mechanisms were culprits behind the mistrust: “We have been talking about regulation for nurses, for doctors, for community health workers, for laboratory scientists, for pharmacists. The systems are there; we are supposed to also have a mechanism to get feedback so that we can resolve complaints. And those who the complaints have identified as culprits for some of those things, we need to begin to sanction them.
“What is most important in Nigeria is that our accountability mechanism is not strong. Outside the country, if anything happens, they will investigate you and suspend your license”, he said.
