The Coordinator of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Plateau, Mr Peter Gai has said that free medical service will soon commence at the grassroots across the state. He was speaking in Jos over the weekend.

Gai said the service would provide diagnoses and treatments for various diseases and that it would be done in selected health centres in the three senatorial districts of the state. He said the exercise was an effort at meeting some key goals of the MDGs while insisting that only patients at the grassroots would benefit from the free medical service.

The Coordinator of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Plateau, Mr Peter Gai has said that free medical service will soon commence at the grassroots across the state. He was speaking in Jos over the weekend.

Gai said the service would provide diagnoses and treatments for various diseases and that it would be done in selected health centres in the three senatorial districts of the state. He said the exercise was an effort at meeting some key goals of the MDGs while insisting that only patients at the grassroots would benefit from the free medical service.

He said “It will involve a holistic medical examination, treatment of different ailments and administration of drugs. Those ailments that are beyond the medical team on the field would be referred to hospitals for proper treatment”.

The coordinator said that the exercise was being anchored by the Plateau Project Support Unit of the MDGs and will precede the inauguration of 97 Primary Health Centres (PHCs) constructed across the state by MDGs. He added that the PHCs were situated in very rural communities to bring healthcare closer to the rural people.

According to him “We are partnering with some NGOs to give us kits for HIV tests so that we can conduct HIV counselling and testing during the free medical service. We will also distribute treated mosquito nets to the residents of the communities we are reaching during the exercise”.

Gai said that the MDGs had complemented government efforts by constructing PHCs and providing needed facilities to make them functional. “We have provided drugs and provided solar panels for energy in various PHCs at the grassroots,” he said.

He said further that medical equipment were recently distributed to some PHCs across the state as part of the Federal Government and Plateau Government 2012 Conditional Grant Scheme. Gai stated that the free medical service is an opportunity to test-run the medical equipment in some of the PHCs.

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Plateau MDGs to begin free medical service