The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in collaboration with a group, Shops Plus has trained over 500 health workers on service delivery in the Federal Capital Territory and Plateau State.
The Technical Director of Shops Plus, Dr Amina Aminu, who made the disclosure on Thursday in Abuja said the programme was organised to improve capacity of workers to provide service delivery in the two states.
Aminu said the programme was designated to increase access of selected essential health care services.
According to her, Shops Plus is an implementing partner, with a mandate to train health workers as well as community members who dwell in the grassroots.
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She said that Shops Plus was responsible for monthly post-training of trainees, to monitor clients and the services rendered by the trained health workers.
“After training, we will provide starter-packs, to aid the trainees’ work.
“Our mandate is not just to train the government health workers but also the community people because they belong to the grassroots.
“We are a service provider and we have been able to train more than 500 health care workers in the FCT and Plateau State,’’ she said.
The Secretary of FCT Health and Human Services Secretariat, Malam Adamu Bappah, said that the secretariat’s collaboration with USAID had been of immense benefit to the territory.
Bappah gave his assurance that the FCT would provide an enabling environment for the achievement of all agreed targets.
According to him, programme is aimed at building capacity of public and private health providers through in-service training.
“This is in line with your family planning performance score-card indicators on outcomes of improved data reporting and improved quality of family planning services with gender sensitivity,’’ he said.
Dr Aretha Ekpo, one of the trained workers, described the gesture as an opportunity never to be forgotten.
Ekpo described the training as valuable because not everybody had such privilege in their health facilities.
“The training has been so beneficial because all of us did not have this opportunity in our various facilities.
“We have been tutored on how to use the starter-packs to give back to the society.
“We will go back to our various facilities and tell them what we have experienced here and what we have learnt,’’ she said.
Shops Plus is a USAID global flagship project being implemented in nine countries. (NAN)
