Health
Health
Caritas Nigeria envisions a society where every member has equitable access to quality healthcare services and enjoys good health and well-being. She works to support programs that focus on the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of communicable and non-communicable diseases, and promote well-being of people at all levels. This includes positive social, mental, and physical health, and promoting maternal, neonatal and children health, including community involvement to ensure sustainable interventions.
Caritas Nigeria’s current health interventions focuses on providing comprehensive HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, care, and support services to individuals and communities in Abia, Enugu, and Imo states. Working with service delivery facilities, community-based organizations, and Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) pick-up sites, we provide HIV testing services, lifesaving treatment, and socioeconomic and psychosocial support services to people living with HIV (PLHIV), and institutional capacity strengthening to HIV management personnel. Deploying an Umbrella Grants Mechanism (UGM), we sub-grant Service Delivery Facilities (SDFs), ART pick-up sites, and community-based organizations (CBOs) to identify, enroll, and deliver quality HIV care services to deserving clients, including orphans and vulnerable children, in the society. To improve health outcomes in communities, we also offer adequate tuberculosis prevention and treatment services in Abia, Bayelsa, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo states.
Similarly, our TB interventions focuses on diagnoses and treatment. Worthy of mention is Caritas Nigeria, through its implementation of the INTERGRATE TB project, is the first organization in Nigeria to implement community-based integrated service delivery using an AI – enabled X-ray devices to screen for TB and Cardiopulmonary conditions, and referring clients for further diagnosis and management.
Caritas Nigeria believes that the sustainability of the HIV program in Nigeria requires strategic simplification of service delivery models, a more targeted approach to stakeholder engagement and unification of the multiple HIV governance structures. Key stakeholders, including Government of Nigeria and the MDAs (Health, Education, Women & Youth Affairs, Finance, Justice, NACA and NHIA), Civil Society Organizations, Faith-Based Organizations, the private sector, and community and religious leaders, must all be involved, in a streamlined and coordinated approach. Simplification efforts, such as integration of HIV services into the broader and routine healthcare system and a strengthened Human Resources for Health, will foster efficiency, enhance local ownership, and ensure that interventions are community and state led as well as adaptable to Nigeria’s diversity and situation. This collaborative approach will align resources and capacity to ensure a cost-effective, scalable, and sustainable HIV prevention, care and treatment response in Nigeria.
