By Kemi Olatunde

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Ondo State played host to creme-la-creme of Nigerians and health experts as the state organised a two day health summit. The event afforded an opportunity to deliberate on how health-care can be improved in the state.
The event with the theme; “Strengthening the health system in a changing world” was held last Monday and Tuesday at the International Culture and Event Centre (The Dome).
Declaring the summit opened, Governor Akeredolu expressed appreciation to participants especially the speakers for their wonderful papers to be delivered noting that the theme was apt as the chosen topics were important adding that the discussants were reliable saying “they are array of speakers that cannot be faulted.”
While noting that his administration has been sustaining the effort of his predecessor, he assured them that he would not relent in positioning the sector for better performance.
While speaking on some of his achievements, he said; “I am glad to inform you that we made giant strides in all of these areas. Unfortunately, COVID-19 Pandemic came in the third year into our first term with its attendant economic crisis which has since put governments across the world in financial strait jackets.
“Notwithstanding the precarious situation we inherited in 2017, you will recall that we had settled six of the seven months arrears of salaries.
“We employed and have continued to employ qualified personnel for our primary, secondary and tertiary health care facilities. We equally brought in several containers of hospital equipment worth billions of naira from the United States.
“Again, we established Teaching Hospital Complexes in both Akure and Ondo city as well as established the Contributory Health Insurance Commission among other achievements that are well known to most of our health sector practitioners in the State.” The Governor said.
He said his administration was determined to sustain and continually improve on efforts at delivering effective and qualitative health care and social welfare services to the people.
He added:”It is trite knowledge that no government anywhere in the world can claim to have done or achieved it all, especially within the context of a changing world and within the perspective of the theme of this summit. It is for this and many other reasons that the decision to focus on the challenges facing our health care delivery system as a government is well thought out.”
Governor Akeredolu also acknowledged that the need to quickly reposition the health sector with utmost commitment and collaboration was a task that must be done by all stakeholders, reassuring all medical and health workers that health care remains a central focus of his administration’s REDEEMED Agenda.
“We will, therefore, spare no effort at promptly attending to your welfare. The current issues relating to salary payment are receiving our attention even at the national level. We are working hard to ensure that our State is better funded and supported without delay in order to deliver on our constitutional responsibility to our people.” He said.
The Governor however, commended the health workers for their level of perseverance in the face of hardship and also appealed to them that their welfare remains a top priority.
Arakunrin Akeredolu further stressed that his administration would not vacillate in its determination to ensure that the people and residents of the state were duly vaccinated against the deadly virus.
“And also leveraging on the summit to discuss developing the needed synergy among the different components of the health sector” she added.
Director General Kano State Drugs and Hospitals Consumables Management Agency, Alhaji Hisham Imam and his counterpart from Niger State, Dr Mohammed Audi spiced the event up by disclosing what obtained in their states’ health sector and also commended Governor Akeredolu for his giant strides in the sector.
In her goodwill message, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, Pharm (Mrs) Folukemi Aladenola commended Akeredolu for his Midas touch in the sector which according to her has resulted to unprecedented feats.
She noted that the summit aimed at discussing the challenges and issues mitigating against quality health care service delivery and also proffered probable solutions to them.
Delivering the keynote address, a renowned medical scholar and Vice Chairman, National Postgraduate Medical College of Nigeria, Prof. Akin Oshintokun stated that Ondo State has all it needs to succeed in the health sector noting that it was one of the states in Nigeria for health insurance mandate.
Describing health as the basis for the generation of wealth and development, he explained that development was impossible without a healthy population.
Listing dominant political philosophy and leadership, financing mechanism, health workforce, rule of law, service delivery mode and providers reward mechanism, research and evidence based decision making and inclusivity and community involvement in health management among others as determinants of health sector performance, he stressed the need for health to be included in all sectors.
While calling on government to ensure the availability of services and protect the access to services by the poor and disadvantaged in society’s overall interest, he noted that health was too important to be left to health care professionals, economists and politicians saying “there is need for the users and potential ushers of health care services.”
A member of Agile Organisation Transformation and Advisory Board member, Transformative Leadership Programme, Prof. Lere Baale while speaking on the importance of teamwork; as essential tool in health care delivery listed lack of clearly stated shared and measurable collective goals, lack of training in inter-professional collaboration, role and leadership ambiguity, team too large or too small and lack of appropriate mechanism, timely exchange of information among others as current barriers to teamwork and called for teamwork in the health sector.
While noting that every professional in the sector was already shaped to make a difference, he however stressed the need for them to complement one another.
Technical Coordinator, Ondo State Transition Strategy and Implementation Committee, Dr. Pat Tolani while speaking on; “the REDEEMED Agenda, health sector perspective,” described Ondo State as the only state in the country that has tied its strategy to the Sustainable Developmental Goal(SDG).
He explained that the SDG 3 which aimed at good health and well-being aspire to ensure health and well-being for all including a bold commitment to end the epidemics of AIDS, TB, malaria, COVID-19 and other communicable diseases by 2030 among others.
He listed effective and sustainable PHc, sustainable financing for health, determinants of health, innovative programming in fragile and vulnerable settings and for Disease Outbreak Response, Research and Development, Innovation and Access and data and digital health as some of the pillars to achieving better health, and noted that all pillars must work together for health and well-being.
The Channaheal community also added glamour to the event with their presentation. It was led by the Dean, Faculty of Agriculture, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba Akoko, Prof. Agbaje Gideon as he gave a detailed description of the activities of the group.
Series of other lectures took place including; “advancing health care delivery through research by the Vice Chancellor University of Medical Sciences (UNIMED) Ondo among others.
Highlight of the event was the showcase of some of the achievements of the present government in the sector which was in admiration of all. In fact, anyone who before then had not be happy with this government will have his anger melted at the innovations of the sector.