Akwa Ibom State Governor, Umo Eno, has approved the immediate release of the 2025 counterpart funding for various health-related interventions across the state.
The State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Ekem John disclosed this while interacting with journalists during a ministerial briefing in Uyo the state capital.
Dr. John stated that the approved funding covers key health programmes, including health insurance, primary healthcare, immunization, family planning, and nutrition.
According to him, “His excellency governor Umo Eno, yesterday not only approved, he also signed that counterpart funding be released before the end of January 2026 for all our programmes. So, immunisation, family planning, nutrition, and health insurance are all covered by that funding, and this year, we are ready to work on these areas”.
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The commissioner said the approval underscores the approval and underscores the commitment of the Umo Eno administration to strengthening the health sector and improving service delivery across the state.
While highlighting major policy reform initiatives undertaken by the ministry during the period under review, he noted that emphasis was placed on strengthening infrastructure, improving staff welfare, training and enhancing service delivery to achieve better health outcomes for the people.
Dr. John also outlined sectoral achievements and challenges, particularly in the areas of leprosy and tuberculosis control, where he said the state has recorded significant progress.
“If you look at the TB indices, Akwa Ibom is doing very well; last year alone, we commissioned five portable X-ray machines with the support of the Global Fund. And let me announce that all suspected TB patients in the health facilities where these machines are installed are to have their x-rays free of charge”, he said.
On HIV/AIDS, the commissioner acknowledged existing challenges but noted improvements in reporting and data management across the state.
“For HIV/AIDS, this is one place where we have not done too well, but in terms of reporting, there has been an improvement. There are now about 168,000 persons living with HIV/AIDS who have been identified in Akwa Ibom State,” he stated.
According to him, “This is progress because it’s down from over 200,000, which it was before. Two reasons accounted for this: The first is that some people did double-counting in order to get anti-retroviral drugs, so some registered in Eket and still registered in other places again. But we have able to do an audit, and we arrive at that figure.”
Dr. John further explained, “It’s a good score that 99% of those who have HIV actually know that they have HIV. One of the challenges is that those who have HIV do not even know that they have it”, adding that efforts are ongoing to improve testing, awareness, and treatment outcomes in the state.