The Jigawa Government says it will train 150 nurses and employ 60 medical doctors in 2016 to address the shortage of medical personnel in the hospitals in the state. Gov. Badaru Abubakar, who made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Dutse, said that the government would establish another school of nursing in Hadejia. Abubakar said that the government decided to take those steps in order to enhance the quality of healthcare in the state.

“What we have discovered in the health sector is an acute shortage of medical personnel – nurses, midwives and doctors. “So we plan to train 150 nurses and 60 doctors abroad next year; also, we plan to have another school of nursing in Hadejia. “So that in a short period of time, we can have between 400 and 500 nurses churned out from different schools here and the ones that we will train abroad to take care of the acute shortage of health personnel.’’ Abubakar said it was in order to address those challenges that the state government allocated N20 billion to the health sector in the 2016 budget.

Minister of Health, Prof Isaac Adewole, has raised the alarm over lack of adequate funding for the health sector, lamenting that the menace of Tuberculosis was not provided for in the 2015 Budget of the ministry. Adewole, who spoke on Friday in Abuja during an interactive meeting with the House of Representatives Standing Committee on HIV, AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Control, said the priority of his ministry will be primary healthcare and a quest for the health sector to be funded appropriately and promoting public health education.

“No budget for TB this year and yet HIV/AIDS is driving TB and TB is driving HIV/AIDS,” the minister said. He also pointed out the need for legislation on the tiers of healthcare services of primary, secondary and tertiary, saying that the responsibility of each level should be spelt to enhance service delivery. “I will plead with our legislators to look into this and specify who does what,” Adewole noted.

Mr Segun Olulade, the Chairman of Lagos State House of Assembly Committee on Health, on Sunday said that the committee would ensure more efficiency in health care delivery in the state. Olulade told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that the Assembly was committed to bringing about a revolution in the health care sector. “I want to assure residents that the health sector in Lagos State will witness a revolution that will bring in efficiency and care. “We will ensure unparalleled health services as far as Nigeria and Africa is concerned.

“We are committed to this promise as we are going to perform our oversight functions as expected. “We will look into areas that people have been making complaints, especially the attitude of the health care providers. "All hands must be on deck; It is our collective responsibility to ensure that we deliver better health care services to residents”.

There is increasing concern that more women are infected by HIV than men as 60 per cent of people living with HIV infections in Africa are women.This can be simply traced to sexual violence including rape and defilement, intergeneration sex which involves young girls having sex with older men (sugar daddies), sex with multiple partners, anal/vaginal sex. TUNDE OGUNTOLA in this piece x-rays why women are more vulnerable to HIV/AIDS Women often experience the impact of HIV infection biologically more severely than men in unprotected heterosexual intercourse as they are twice as likely as men to acquire HIV from an infected partner.

The HIV virus that causes AIDS is transmitted through two major routes. The first, which accounts for 80 per cent of the cases, is through unprotected sex between men and women. This is followed by HIV transmission from mother to child during pregnancy, labour and breastfeeding, which is responsible for about 20 per cent of the cases. As part of activities commemorating the 2015 World AIDS Day which was the 35th the US Ambassador to Nigeria, James Entwistle said there is urgent need to take greater action to tackle the menace which he said, “The time to act is now.” That is the theme of this 35th World AIDS Day. This theme conveys the urgency of the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS. The strategy behind the UN program is simple, and involves information, treatment, and suppression of the disease.

The World Health Organisation’s (WHO) 2014 report has stated that the maternal mortality rate in Nigeria is 560 deaths per 100,000 live births and one-third of all global maternal deaths are concentrated in two populous countries which includes Nigeria, after India. This was revealed, weekend, by the executive director of Women Advocates’ Research and Documentation Centre (WARDC), Dr Abiola Akiyode Afolabi at the “National Roundtable: Sustainable Development Goals Gender Equality and Maternal Health” in Abuja.

She said women in Nigeria still face financial barriers, infrastructural and institutional barriers in accessing adequate maternal healthcare and are still been detained for inability to pay high user fees and lose their lives in the process. “The 2014 millennium Development Goals report almost one-third of all global maternal deaths are concentrated in two populous countries: India, with an estimated 50,000 maternal deaths (17%) and Nigeria, with an estimated 40,000 maternal deaths (14%) while the WHO 2014 report on maternal mortality states that Nigeria’s MMR is 560 deaths per 100,000 live births.”

Mr Nurudeen Mohammed, Registrar, Pharmacists Council of Nigeria (PCN), on Tuesday said the Federal Government would stop open sale and hawking of drugs by 2017. Mohammed disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja. He said the council was collaborating with law enforcement agencies and other regulatory bodies to tackle the menace. He said that open drug marketers were expected to move to designated centres like the National Drug Distribution Centres and Coordinated Wholesale Centres to carry out their activities.

According to him, the centres are component of the National Drug Distribution Guideline structures which are private sector driven facilities. He urged those saddled with the task to expedite actions toward construction of those facilities to avoid being sanctioned at the expiration of the set date. Mohammed said that the federal government in its bid to curtail the menace of open drug sale, among others, established NDDG, which incorporated Coordinated Wholesale Centres, among others.

The Joint Health Sector Union (JOHESU) at the weekend condemned the closure of the Federal Medical Centre (FMC), Owerri by the minister of health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, declaring that the minister acted against the resolutions reached by stakeholders after its joint tripartite negotiation meeting. The union in a statement signed by JOHESU chairman, comrade Biobelemoye Joy Josiah, the vice chairman, Dr. Ogbonna Obinna and the secretary Florence Ekpebor also called on President Muhammadu Buhari to intervene in the crisis rocking the FMC, Oweri.

It stated that the decision to temporary shutdown the medical centre by the minister came as a surprise to the entire labour leaders and stakeholders in the health sector. The unions said the closure of the FMC was not among the options arrived at in a meeting held at the centre in Owerri on December 4, which has in attendance the minister himself, members of House of Representatives and the union leaders who all travelled down to Oweri for the crucial meeting.

Osun State Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has issued a seven-day ultimatum to striking medical doctors in the state to return to their duty posts or be seen as having voluntarily resigned their appointments with the state government. Aregbesola in a public service announcement released by the Permanent Secretary, Human Resources and Capacity Building, Mr Sunday Festus Olajide, said despite series of appeals from government to medical doctors in Ladoke Akintola University of Technology Teaching Hospital (LAUTECH), Osogbo and other government health institutions to show understanding, the striking doctors have remained adamant.

It contented that the doctors have continued to draw their salaries in the last two months and still remain at home thus eating their cake and still having it. The government in the statement said that any striking doctor that failed to return to work on or before the expiration of seven- day ultimatum beginning from 18th December 2015 should consider himself or herself of having voluntarily resigned his or her appointment with government.

The federal government has inaugurated a 5-man interim management committee to look into the‎ crisis that has disrupted activities at the Federal Medical Centre, Owerri, Imo state, with the intention of restoring lasting peace and services. The committee has been saddled with 11 terms of reference and is expected to complete the job within six months of its inauguration and chat a roadmap towards the achievement of delivering health services to the people. This was revealed, Monday, by the minister of health, Prof Isaac Adewole at the Federal Ministry of Health, Abuja, when he ‎inaugurated the committee to be supervised by Prof Ndubisi Eke.

He stated that despite all entreaty to end the crisis, the unions rebuffed federal governments request to give a 3-month moratorium to work with the management, within which period it would make resources available to address some of their welfare issues in addition to improving the lot of the hospital, hence the decision to shut dowm the hospital. He said the committee is expected to “take over all administrative, technical, operational and financial functions of the centre and restore humane healthcare services, review events leading up to the industrial unrest and ensure inter/intra professional harmony among all cadres of staff and take inventory of all properties, assets and liabilities of the centre.”

No fewer than 2,000 widows in Nenwe community of Enugu State are to benefit from the Rural Health Insurance Scheme, sponsored by Jonalfa Hope International Foundation. The founder of the foundation, retired Air Vice-Marshal Chris Chukwu, announced this on Thursday in Nenwe during the inauguration of Nenwe Health Scheme. Chukwu, an indigene of the community, noted that the gesture was to bring succour to the widows, whom he said are suffering untold hardship. He said that Nenwe with 27 villages have over 3,000 widows.

“We embarked on a re-verification exercise to have an authentic data of widows in the community and the actual numbers we will be sponsoring. “At the end of the exercise, 2,000 widows were captured and we are making a commitment to sponsor them in 2016, and beyond as our finances can go, “ he said. Chukwu said that the foundation had deposited N2.5 million out of N7.2 million required for the scheme annually. He appealed to the managers of the scheme to review downward the registration fees for beneficiaries to enable more people to participate.