By Egena Sunday Ode
Vice President Kashim Shettima has restated the Federal Government’s determination to improve welfare, guarantee legal rights and ensure salary reliability for community health workers.
He said fair, competitive and consistent remuneration for medical personnel is vital to building robust community health services across Nigeria.
Shettima spoke on Thursday in Abuja when he launched the Community Health Programme Continental Acceleration Plan 2026–2030 at the Continental High-Level Forum on a Fit-for-Purpose Health Workforce.
He said the nation cannot afford to take community health workers for granted, noting that their numbers are rising across Africa but threats to delivery remain.
“Our Community Health Programme Continental Acceleration Plan focuses on governance, primary care integration, workforce development, digital systems, service delivery, financing, supplies and accountability as drivers of our future. A future where workers are guaranteed legal recognition, certification, dependable salaries, supervision and careers,” he said.
The Vice President said the distance between a household and a health worker could mean the difference between survival and mourning, adding that government must shorten that distance until no African’s chance of living depends on where he was born.
He described President Bola Tinubu as a pacesetter in financing health reform and advancing Africa’s workforce agenda as AU Champion, recalling that Ministers of Health and Finance convened in Addis Ababa in February on behalf of the President.
Shettima noted that 25 years after the Abuja Declaration pledged at least 15 per cent of national budgets to health, Nigeria must account for households still beyond healthcare reach.
He thanked the African Union Commission, Africa CDC, UNICEF, Community Health Delivery Partnership, WHO, IFRC and other partners for supporting Nigeria’s health journey.
“We cannot afford the luxury of taking our community health workers for granted. We have survived the storms of a world threatened by diseases because they recognise maternal danger, because they find unvaccinated children, because they gather household data and, very importantly, because they detect outbreaks,” he said.
He said health security demands sufficient skilled workers who are fairly paid, supported and equitably deployed, lamenting that external health financing is shrinking while 85 per cent of member states depend heavily on donors for community health.
Shettima said Nigeria’s community health workforce falls short of the 315,000 required by 2030, but President Tinubu’s Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative has secured over $2.2 billion in commitments, with plans to revitalise over 17,000 primary health centres and train 120,000 frontline workers.
“Our goal is 100,000 salaried community health workers by 2027,” he said.
On the new Plan, he said it calls for properly equipped workers, reliable medical supplies, community participation and integrated digital registries under African control.
“Its ambitious scenario requires about US$28 billion through 2030, with over 80 per cent devoted to recurrent costs, and projects US$19 in economic and social benefits for every dollar invested,” he said, adding that every country must commit to one nationally owned plan, one budget and one monitoring framework.
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