By GARBA MUHAMMAD, Kaduna

The Kaduna State Accountability Maternal New-born and Child Accountability Mechanism (KADMAM) with support from Legislative Initiative for Sustainable Development (LISDEL), has conducted the first phase of activities to operationalise the Kaduna State Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF) Accountability Framework by implementing some of the advocacy activities identified in the developed work plan.

BHCPF as an important provision of the National Health Act (2014) is an innovative financing mechanism established by the Act to improve delivery and access to primary health care in Nigeria.

This was necessitated by various funding constraints to appropriately finance primary health care in the country, leading to suboptimal health outcomes and indices.

Speaking at a one-day advocacy engagement with the Kaduna State Ministry of Health and other partners in the state, the Co-Chairman (CSO) of KADMAM, Mallam Mustapha Jumare outlined the importance of establishing and operationalising effective accountability mechanisms, structures and tools to track implementation of the BHCPF in the state.

According to him, the activities will ensure the full implementation of the BHCPF, as well as transparency and efficient management of the fund.

In her opening remarks, Commissioner of Health , Kaduna State, Amina Mohammed Baloni explained that, health been the business of all, need more voices and contributions from various stakeholders to achieve the said objective.

She hinted that Primary Healthcare, being the tier of health that 80% of the population access, should therefore be effectively improved for the betterment of citizens of the state.

She called on CSOs and the media to improve understanding of Nigerian health system towards optimisation of Primary Healthcare Service delivery and health advocacy in Kaduna state.

Meanwhile, Dr. Umar Faruk Abubakar, Kaduna State Coordinator, LISDEL, said the specific objective of the activity is to conduct advocacy outreaches to key stakeholders and actors in the State to track some of the indicators as provided in the Kaduna state BHCPF Accountability.

•PHOTO: Participants at the one-day advocacy engagements on the first phase of activities to operationalize the Kaduna State Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF) Accountability Framework with Commissioner of Health, Kaduna State, Amina Mohammed Baloni (middle), the media and other partners in Kaduna. Photo credit: LISDEL.