NSSF, PHCDA, Flags Off Routine Immunisation Programme in C’River

Bassey Inyang in Calabar

A Non-Governmental Organisation, the Nigeria Solidarity Support Fund (NSSF) working in collaboration with the Primary Healthcare Development Agency (PHCDA), has flagged off a massive routine immunisation programme in Cross River State.

Speaking during the flag off of the programme in Calabar on Tuesday, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the NSSF, Dr. Fejiro Chinye-Nwoko, said that he would strengthen supervision of the optimised outreach for routine immunisation in Cross River State and other places throughout Nigeria that would benefit from the programme.

“This pilot project marks the beginning of NSSF’s collaboration with both the private and public sectors to address poor routine immunisation challenges in Nigeria after a successful collaboration to improve COVID-19 vaccination in the past.

“The immunisation outreaches will be carried out by skilled healthcare workers from the communities, with supervision provided by community members and healthcare professionals at various levels of governance including wards, local government, state, and national levels.

“This multi-level supervision approach ensures effective implementation, delivery, and accountability throughout the process,” she said.

Chinye-Nwoko said that her organization, in collaboration with its international donor agency, IHS , were in the state to flag off, and witness part of the immunisation outreach that is ongoing in all wards across the state.

The CEO said that the funds earmarked for the programme to strengthen the conduct and supervision of the ongoing immunisation would be released in trenches based on the work plan of the PHCDA in the state.

She said that the support fund would mop up opportunities for children immunisation against killer diseases like polio, cholera, and Corona virus measles, among others.

Chinye-Nwoko said that there is increase in mortality rate of children between the ages of zero to five years annually due to these epidemics.

Also speaking, the Cross River State’s Commissioner for Health in the state, Dr. Egbe Ayuk, admonished the PHCDA to ensure proper monitoring of the funds for the immunisation exercise using the existing templates to save cost.

Ayuk advocated a good analysis of funding lines and called for community engagement processes for easy supervision and distribution of funds judiciously.

He urged the funding organisations to give priority to local and credible NGOs that have worked very close with the people at the grass root levels.

The Director of Diseases Control and Immunisation (DCI), in Cross River, Dr. Joy Chabo,  told journalists that the event was an entry meeting of PHCDA and its partner  known as NSSF, which has come  to support the state in the optimal outreach immunisation that is ongoing in the state.

Chabo said that her agency and the state’s Ministry of Health have set the machinery on ground by developing the plan which their partner is conversant with.

She said that the NGO’s support from the funding by its donor agency, HIS, would increase the outreach immunisation in the state.