Rakiya Muhammad
4 August 2008
Sokoto — State governments in the country have been urged to give 15percent of their budgetary allocation to health sector in line with the World Health Organization (WHO) recommendation.
The call was contained in a communiqué issued at the end of a three-day dissemination workshop on Advocacy for Reproductive Health for media professionals organized by a Kano-based development research and projects centre.
The workshop, which assessed the result of baseline and end line surveys of maternal health situations and health allocations in Bauchi, Borno, Kaduna, Katsina and Zamfara States, noted with concern that none of these states met the 15% WHO requirement of the total budget to the health sector.
It also observed that funds allocated to health sector in some of the states were not disbursed or accessed by the units concerned.
The workshop, which also noted that the North East and North West have the worst maternal health indices in the country, urged states in these regions to make deliberate and sustained efforts to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity by improving health sector allowances to meet the WHO standard by the year 2015.
It called on members of the state Houses of Assembly to discharge their oversight functions by ensuring fair allocation and utilization of funds.
The workshop also challenged media professionals to live up to their social responsibilities by championing budget allocations to the health sector, its timely release and optimal utilization.
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