Communities Urge Increased Drone Deliveries to Boost Services in Cross River

Community health workers have sued for the use of drone technology for increased delivery of medical products and equipment as a means of encouraging villagers to patronize primary healthcare centres in parts of Cross River State, southern Nigeria.

READ ALSO: Kwara State: Health workers receive 100% CONHESS, hazard allowance

The health workers, who are stationed in Mfuma and Ijiraga villages of Yala local government area in the northern district of Cross River State, disclosed that since the introduction of Zipline drone technology to enhance delivery of medicines and other consumables, they have witness immense changes amongst the people.

One of the respondents, the Community Health Officer in charge of Primary Health Centre, Ijiraga, Mr. Augustine Okputu noted that the use of drones had improved access to healthcare services and would enable Cross River State achieve the Universal Health Coverage in Sustainable Development Goal 3.

The changes

He said, “This technology has come to fulfil the vision of the primary healthcare delivery, which is to make medical services affordable, available and accessible to the people in villages. It takes barely 14 minutes to receive our orders here, which a good thing because time spent on the road has been reduced.

“Besides, the hazard of traveling, cost of transportation has been reduced. Zipline has made it easy, comfortable, and affordable with just a phone call or text message and we get our supplies. All the supplies, especially vaccines arrive in good conditions. It has also reduced pilfering, eliminated the problem of acquiring expired or fake medications. Most importantly, we get our supplies on demand,” Okputu further said.

Another Community Health Officer at the Primary Health Centre Mfuma-Ntrigom, Mr. Rapheal Obock stated, “This drone service is the best for us. We have been using it for over one year now and the benefits are huge. One delivery is cheap, fast and accurate. The service is readily available for us especially during emergencies. Here, the people are very happy to see drones deliver their medicines and consumables. It has improved immunization tremendously.”

While calling for more Vaccines from the Nigerian and Cross River State Governments, Obock stated, “I will urged the State and Nigerian Government to deploy drone delivery services for all primary healthcare facilities in the state and all over the country. Everything PHC should be with drones.”

Extending services

In an interview, a spokesperson for Governor Bassey Otu, Mr. Edem Darlington, who is the deputy Chief Press Secretary, assured that the present administration was determined to sustain and build on notable gains of previous governments in the health sector.

Darlington said, “When Governor Otu was campaigning, he made his message very clear from day one and repeatedly mentioned that he was going to leverage and sustain the gains of other administrations form 1999.

“The governor intends to extend the drone medicine delivery services to other local government areas in the state, so that more rural communities could be accessed. Cross River has very hard to reach communities that one has to pass through other States to reach those communities. In this regard, drone services would actually help. Apart from that the governor intends to engage additional manpower to boost primary healthcare services,” he said.

In Cross River State, 500 PHCs in 9 local government areas are linked to the drone service and these include Obanliku, Obudu, Bekwara, Ikom, Yala, Etung, Boki, Obubra and Ogoja, the host of the Zipline nest.