RSG, Group Partner On Family Health

Head of Department, Ophthalmology, Garki Hospital, Dr Bitto Sewueze attending to a patient during free eye screening to mark 2016 World Glaucoma Week in Abuja last Tuesday.

The Rivers State
Government has assured that it will partner professional organisations in ensuring the safety and health of children and their mothers in the state.
Deputy Governor of Rivers State, Dr Ipalibo Harry Banigo, stated this Friday when members of Society for Family Health, a non-governmental organization (NGO) with headquarters in Abuja, paid her advocacy visit in Government House, Port Harcourt.
Banigo, who reiterated the commitment of Governor Nyesom Wike’s administration towards providing quality and affordable health services, said the collaboration would help to check infant and maternal mortality rate in the state.
“The state government is doing a lot in the health sector and we are going to do more to enhance the health of our people,” Banigo asserted.
She commended the NGO for offering to provide some services free to the people of Rivers State such as the distribution of 500 Misoprostol tablets for post-abortion care, counselling and implementation of Clinic Record Management System.
The deputy governor said the officials of the Ministry of Health and the Health Management Board would be mandated to fashion out the mode of partnership that will lead to the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), between the organization and the state government.
Banigo noted that the implementation of the programme would not be difficult since the state government already had a programme for family health, pointing out that Ministry of Health officials would be saddled with the responsibility of midwifing the partnership, to ensure things are done “transparently” for the good health of the people.
Earlier, the Project Director, Society for Family Health, Dr. Anthony Nwala, had said they were in the state to start a health project that would provide quality healthcare in private and public sectors.
Nwala disclosed that the organization was founded in 1983 in partnership with Population Services International as an intervention agent in health, noting that it was the first NGO to receive funding from an international donor agency, United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
He solicited for partnership with the Rivers State Government and the introduction of post-abortion care into the nursing curriculum to equip the healthcare service providers with requisite training.
The Society for Family Health director said the organization had concluded plans to establish an office in Port Harcourt and to recruit personnel that would assist in driving the implementation process.