The Nigerian government revealed that the FG is ready to achieve its goal of building 100 oxygen generating plants since the start of the pandemic to ensure oxygen efficiency.
This was revealed by Health Minister Dr Osagie Ehanire at the 17th edition of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration scorecard series.
The Minister noted that before the pandemic started in 2020, Nigeria had fewer than 30 oxygen generating plants.
oxygen sufficiency: The Health Minister stated that FG noticed that he had fewer than 30 plants when the pandemic raised concerns for achieving oxygen sufficiency and healthcare delivery, saying:
- “During the course of COVID-19, we realized the importance of oxygen, and that the oxygen plants we previously had in the country were less than 30, many of them not working, so the first thing we did was seek support to activate the existing oxygen plants and build new ones.
- “The Federal Government built one oxygen plant per state in each of the federal institutions and then we were able to obtain funds from the Global Fund and UNICEF to build more.
Committed to 100: Ehanire added that FG is committed to achieving 100 oxygen generating plants and has built 90 so far.
- “Today we have more than 90 oxygen generating plants from less than 30 functional before and we are going to have an oxygen generating plant in each senate area so that we have more than 100 functional oxygen plants.
- “This is so that oxygen is available throughout the country and we have total oxygen sufficiency for both private and public hospitals and even for Primary Health Care (APS) centers throughout the country and the issue of the lack of oxygen will be a topical issue. past.”
Health Provision Fund: He also added that FG launched the Basic Healthcare Provision Fund (BHCPF), which has received and disbursed over N101 billion to over 7,600 APS facilities across the country as of October 2022, citing that the APS spending represented only 4.6 percent of current spending. health spending. He added:
- “Although general public spending on health increased, it was not enough to reduce out-of-pocket spending, which increased from 71.5% in 2019 to 72.8% in 2020, still far from our target of less than 40%.
- “Our joint effort is still required to further the quest to reduce out-of-pocket costs, improve healthcare system efficiency, increase government spending on healthcare, and expand prepaid coverage and financial risk protection mechanisms.”
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The Nigerian government I declare that passengers visiting Nigeria would be tested using rapid diagnostic tests (RTD) as Covid-19 cases increase in China following the end of lockdown restrictions in China.
Dr Geoffrey Okatubo, Director of Port Health Services, said positive cases would be quarantined and all negative cases would be monitored as he plans to test incoming passengers using the Rapid Diagnostic Test (RTD). .
- “COVID-19 self-tests (RTD) will be delivered at all our international airports, land and sea borders, while travelers will also be informed about the importance of measures they can take to prevent infection.”
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