Our primary health centres are ill-equipped but we keep building more – Boss Mustapha

The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, said the over 10, 000 public primary health centres in the country were ill-equipped and ineffective; while the government was busy building more.

He warned that Nigeria risks another pandemic if it fails to take advantage of opportunities presented by the COVID-19 pandemic to develop its health infrastructure.

He said this in Abuja on Monday while inaugurating the Board of Experts of the Healthcare Sector Research and Development Intervention Scheme.

“If we had built on the experiences of Ebola and other epidemics that we’ve dealt with in the past, probably today we wouldn’t have started with about two molecular laboratories for the testing of COVID-19.

“If you travel the shores of this country, you’ll find out that we have over 10,000 public primary healthcare centres scattered inwards and villages across the country ill-equipped, ineffective and not being put into use, but we keep building them,” Mustapha said.

He urged members of the board to look at governance structures in the healthcare sector apart from your primary responsibilities.