The Taraba Primary Health Care Development Agency has commenced a 3-day orientation for 250 newly recruited adhoc Community Health Extension Workers (CHEWs) under the GAVI-HSS programme.
Declaring the training opened in Jalingo on Friday, the Commissioner for Health, Dr Innocent Vakkai, congratulated the trainees and called on them to consider themselves fortunate for the privilege to serve as CHEWs under the programme.
Represented by the Executive Secretary of the state’s Primary Health Care Development Agency, Dr Aminu Hassan, the commissioner enjoined them to be good ambassadors of the agency and be guided by the standing order of community health practitioners in discharging their responsibilities.
He explained that the training was to familiarise the participants with the activities and programmes of the agency in order to reposition them for effective and efficient provision of primary health care services across the state.
The commissioner said that the training was the climax of a process which began three years ago under the watch of the agency in collaboration with Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI).
He explained that the exercise involved a rigorous process of situation analysis, programme support rationale, work plan development and reviews, among others.
“These processes eventually led to the signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Taraba State Government led by the Feputy Governor, Alhaji Haruna Manu, and GAVI in February, 2022.
“Taraba state is one out of eight states selected for the GAVI support fund.
“The support which has been released through UNICEF is geared towards Health System Strengthening (HSS) in the state,” he said.
The Executive Secretary of the agency, Dr Aminu Hassan, in his own separate remarks, noted the passion shown by his team and effort put in by government to ensure that a workable primary health system in the state is systematically paying off.
He disclosed that, among others, success stories recorded was the recruitment and the ongoing training of qualified adhoc CHEWs who are being reengineered to drive the health system in the state through the GAVI support fund.
He disclosed that the CHEWs were drawned from across the 16 local government areas of the state.
Aminu attributed the achievements and success stories of the agency to the sustained support of Gov. Darius Ishaku.
Reports have it that other organisations, including NPHCDA, WHO and UNICEF, who are partnering with the agency gave goodwill messages and reassured of their continuous support for the state to achieve the Universal Health Care delivery target.
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