By Adewale Banjo
Ogun State Primary Health Care Development Board (OGPHCDB) has adopted a policy, Task Shifting/Task Sharing, to address shortage of skilled health providers in the state’s primary health care centres.
Commissioner for Health, Babatunde Ipaye, disclosed this at the unveiling of a document on the policy for essential health care services in the state held at Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, Abeokuta.
Ipaye said government had taken the step in collaboration with Pathfinder International to improve health indicators in order to meet national and global expectations on Universal Health Coverage (UCH) in the state.
The commissioner said it was necessary to spell out the specific tasks and responsibilities to be shifted from highly qualified medical personnel to the lower ones and offer opportunities to train the less qualified health workers to acquire competence on the task to be shifted.
Acting Executive Secretary of the board, Elijah Ogunsola, said the decision was in line with the approval and recommendations of the 57th National Council on Health aimed at reducing mortality and morbidity rates across health centres in the state.
In his remarks, Country Representative, Pathfinder International, Farouk Jega, explained that the arrangement would bridge the gap created by uneven distribution of health workers, migration effects and low productivity of the workforce in the health sector.