UNICEF, FG, partners move to boost Rivers oxygen plant

Dr. Ifeyinwa Anyanyo, UNICEF, Enugu Field Officer,(m), Dr. Okere Claribel, MD, Nchia General Hospital, Hajia Fatima Haruna Ibrahim, Associate Director, Sustainability, IHS Towers Nigeria, Dr. Bright Ogbonda, CMD Rivers State Hospitals Management Board and other officials during the joint inspection visit by UNICEF and IHS Towers to the Oxygen Plant donated to Eleme General Hospital, Nchia, Rivers State.

The United Nations Children’s Fund and IHS Towers have reaffirmed their partnership with the Federal Ministry of Health and the Rivers State Government to ensure the sustainability and expansion of the oxygen plant project in the state.

The two organisations gave the assurance during a joint inspection visit to the oxygen plant project located inside Nchia General Hospital in Eleme Local Government Area of Rivers State on Wednesday.

The project was constructed and commissioned in 2023 through a partnership involving the Federal Ministry of Health, the Canadian Government, IHS Towers and UNICEF as a direct response to the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic in the country.

The joint inspection visit was led by Dr Ifeyinwa Anyanyo, a UNICEF health specialist and Head of Enugu Field Office, and Hajia Fatima Haruna Ibrahim, Associate Director, Sustainability, IHS Nigeria.

During the visit, Anyanyo lauded the Rivers State Government for keeping the facility running since it was established.

Anyanyo said UNICEF was satisfied with the commitment demonstrated by the state government towards sustaining the project, adding that the agency was ready to support its expansion and sustainability.

“As a state, they’ve done well but there’s also opportunity for expansion because the whole idea of setting up this gas plant was to increase access to medical oxygen.

“And that was coming from the challenge of the COVID-19 response where we saw that medical oxygen was a major gap.

“As I said, there’s opportunity, there’s room for improvement and that is why we’re here. That’s why we’re talking about sustainability and strengthening the efforts that the state has already shown and the commitment they’ve shown to work with them and see how we can increase the capacity more,” she stated.

Anyanyo further said the joint visit had afforded the partners the opportunity to interact with the plant operators, obtain firsthand information about their operations and identify some of the challenges facing the facility.

She assured the state that the partners would review the findings from the visit and consider how to further assist the government in enhancing the facility’s capacity.

“We are going to review, working closely with the partners. As I noted earlier, it’s a joint collaboration and that is why the visit was done jointly.

“So we’ve all been here, both of us in IHS and UNICEF, we’ve seen what the issues are, and then that will be tabled and discussed, and then get all the other partners, including the government, involved in the discussion.

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“But just to assure the state that we are going to discuss this further and see how to better support them,” the UNICEF health specialist said.

In his remarks, the Chief Medical Director of the Rivers State Hospitals’ Management Board, Dr Bright Ogbonda, commended UNICEF, IHS Towers and other contributing partners for donating the plant to the state.

Ogbonda said the plant had been of immense help to the state in providing oxygen for patients and had also served neighbouring states, including Bayelsa and Imo.

While noting that the plant had not been operating optimally due to the absence of a regular power supply, he appealed to the partner agencies to help install solar power at the facility to enable it to meet the demands of health facilities in the region.

“Let me give credit to UNICEF IHS Towers and other donors for installing this oxygen gas plant. It has really helped us.

“The plant is running and is producing and is able to supply oxygen to most of our facilities in the state and even beyond River State.

“So as Chief Medical Director, I want to appeal to sponsors to please support this facility to ensure that we have energy by solarising this plant, and also help to connect it to the national grid, which will to some extent help support with the energy.

“Most importantly, I will advocate for solarisation, which will help to increase production, increase the profitability margin, and also, with the Oxygen Account opened, help to save a little bit more money so that the plant can be sustained,” Dr Ogbonda stated.

Calling on health facilities to patronise the plant, the CMD emphasised that procuring oxygen from the facility was cheaper than obtaining it from other facilities in the region.

The plant operator, Engr Epelle ThankGod, said the facility had the capacity to produce 18 cubic metres of oxygen per hour.

ThankGod said the plant could produce 60 cylinders of 40 litres of oxygen daily.

However, he lamented that the lack of a constant power supply had reduced the plant’s production capacity to just 20 cylinders of 40 litres of oxygen per day.