The Bayelsa State Government says it will deploy 19 doctors, 210 nurses and midwives, 185 pharmacy technicians and about 50 laboratory medical technicians to primary healthcare centres across the state.
The State Commissioner for Health, Prof. Seiyefa Brisibe, disclosed this on Friday while speaking about the government’s efforts to strengthen healthcare delivery at the grassroots.
Brisibe spoke during a training organised by the Health Emergency Initiative, sponsored by FIRST E&P, under its First Respondent Training and Medical Intervention Programme.
“We are deploying 19 doctors, 210 nurses and midwives, 185 pharmacy technicians and about 50 laboratory medical technicians to strengthen the clinical component of our primary healthcare centres,” the commissioner said.
He explained that the deployment was aimed at strengthening clinical services at primary healthcare centres, which he said were often largely run by community health extension workers and environmental health officers.
Brisibe said the move would provide residents, particularly those in rural communities, with better access to qualified medical personnel closer to their homes.
“If you look at the scope, community health workers and environmental health workers will do about public health. So in our primary healthcare centres, where my mother, who stays in the village, is going to access first, the clinical component is not strong enough,” he said.
The commissioner said regular visits by doctors to rural health facilities would also encourage residents to patronise the centres and enable medical personnel to provide appropriate treatment or referrals.
“If in a society or a community where there are no doctors and they hear that once in 10 days a medical doctor comes to consult in a place where there is a nurse or a midwife, definitely that day people will come,” he said.
Brisibe said the doctors would be deployed across the state’s 18 local government areas and 24 constituencies.
He explained that areas with difficult terrain and more constituencies would receive more doctors, citing Southern Ijaw, Brass and Ekeremor, which would each receive three doctors, while other areas would receive two.
He added that the state would deploy 210 nurses and midwives, 185 pharmacy technicians and about 50 laboratory medical technicians, alongside a smaller number of environmental health officers.
According to the commissioner, the recruitment and deployment process had reached its final stage, with the government having completed the necessary personnel documentation.
He said the workers were expected to begin their assignments within the month.
“The whole thing is to strengthen the clinical component of our primary healthcare so that we can still meet demand. And I believe that that is going to give us the desired outcomes,” Brisibe said.
FIRST E&P backs emergency-response training
Also speaking at the event, the Executive Director, Corporate Services, FIRST E&P, Emmanuel Etomi, stressed the importance of timely intervention during emergencies.
“During a medical emergency, road traffic accident, cardiac arrest, or other life-threatening incident, the difference between life and death can be measured in minutes,” Etomi said.
He said young people should be equipped with basic emergency-response skills that could help victims before professional medical assistance arrived.
According to him, the training would help students respond appropriately to emergencies at school, at home, on the road and within their communities.
He said the Health Emergency Initiative was helping to bridge the gap by promoting timely emergency assistance and affordable immediate care.
Etomi disclosed that HEI had previously benefited from the 2025 Impact FIRST Grant Programme, an initiative of the NNPC Limited/FIRST E&P Joint Venture.
He said the grant had enabled the organisation to expand its provision of lifesaving medical assistance and emergency-response training.
Etomi added that HEI was among the five inaugural beneficiaries of Impact FIRST: Heritage, a multi-year funding programme launched by the NNPC Limited/FIRST E&P Joint Venture to support organisations with strong governance, measurable impact and sustainable results.
He described the partnership as a shift from grant-making to long-term collaboration.
HEI seeks change in emergency response
The Executive Director and founder of HEI, Paschal Achunine, said the training was designed to encourage people to take action during emergencies rather than simply record incidents on social media.
“Our expectation is that as opposed to the current practice, where people take pictures and videos and put on social media when an emergency happens, we’ll see more proactive response, a robust response from young people,” Achunine said.
He said participants were being trained in basic first aid, cardiopulmonary resuscitation and other pre-hospital skills that could improve the survival chances of accident victims and people experiencing cardiovascular emergencies.
Achunine said the initiative was particularly important because many people who suffer emergencies do not receive appropriate assistance before reaching a hospital.
He also noted that road traffic crashes accounted for a significant number of deaths among young people and said first-responder training could help reduce preventable deaths.
According to Achunine, more than 30 per cent of deaths in Nigeria occur during the pre-hospital stage, making early intervention critical.
He said HEI had operated a post-crash care programme since 2017 through partnerships with organisations including the Federal Road Safety Corps and hospitals, providing up to N100,000 in deposit support for critically injured crash victims taken to hospitals.
He explained that the first-responder training complemented the programme by equipping members of the public to take appropriate lifesaving action before victims reached medical facilities.
Achunine also disclosed that HEI had partnered with the Nigeria Educational Research and Development Council to integrate emergency health education into the school curriculum.
He said approval had been obtained to introduce the programme into composite subjects in primary and secondary schools.
“In the coming months, in the new academic year, we’ll start seeing emergency health education, which is a more robust version of this training conducted in parts and conducted with practical applications in secondary and primary schools,” he said.
The Bayelsa Government said the deployment of additional health workers and continued investment in emergency-response training were part of efforts to improve healthcare outcomes across the state.