By Mike Adeyemi
Kwara State has been rated low in the area of primary healthcare service delivery particularly at the grassroots.
A medical expert, Dayo Awoyale noted this during a medical outreach held at Apata-helbron Medical Centre, Eyenkorin, Ilorin, Kwara State capital, recently.
According to him, healthcare delivery at the secondary level in Kwara state is outstanding in comparison with the primary healthcare.
“At the grassroots, I will rate primary healthcare services performance in Kwara State at 20 per cent. I think the government can do better in this regard.
“The state government has to prioritise primary healthcare across hamlets and villages in the state. In time past, I think that is how it was. “
Speaking on the essence of the programme, Awoyale noted that there are many communities in the state that don’t have acess to healthcare services.
“So, we have made the medical outreach an annual event to ensure people in these communities get healthcare service, where we treat them of various ailments and give them drugs for free, “he said.
He further stressed that since the introduction of the medical outreach to villages and communities across the state, it has gone a long way to impact lots of people who hitherto had no access to medical care.
“It was so shocking that there are people with chronic ailment without any medical attention, owing to lack of money. Part of the test conducted on them shows some are living with HIV and other chronic diseases, and we have connected them with specialist hospitals,” he added.
The surgeon further noted that the major challenges of the affected people are poverty and illiteracy.
“It is unfortunate that the affluence in the society are not particular about the medical plight of these downtrodden,” he lamented
In his address, the Chief Medical Director, Apata-helbron Medical Centre, Dr. Kayode Adeniji lauded the convener of the medical outreach for bringing healthcare services to the less privileged.
He disclosed that the outreach is being organised by a member of Ilorin University Medical Students Association (ILUMSA) in other to expose medical students to grassroots health services.
“The purpose is to reach out to communities within the suburb as a result of their inability to access medical care which is beyond their reach.
“There is no health insurance in Nigeria, because poverty has bedridden majority of the people. So, outreaches like this would abate or cushion the suffering many people are confronted within the cause of trying to access qualitative healthcare,” he said.
