Govs adopt tool to track disease outbreak readiness

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The Nigeria Governors’ Forum, in collaboration with the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Bank and Resolve to Save Lives Nigeria, has launched a health security scorecard to strengthen monitoring of states’ preparedness for infectious disease outbreaks and other public health emergencies.

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The scorecard was unveiled on Wednesday during a health security scorecard validation workshop in Abuja, where health experts and development partners described the initiative as a critical tool for assessing gaps in state-level health security systems and driving evidence-based interventions.

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Speaking at the workshop on Wednesday, the Executive Director, Programme Partnership at the NGF Secretariat, Dr Ahmad Abdulwahab, said the initiative was designed to establish a unified framework for evaluating health security governance across the 36 states.

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“At the Nigeria Governors’ Forum Secretariat, we firmly believe that true health security is built from the ground up.

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“While national frameworks provide the architecture, subnational execution and accountability are the bedrock upon which epidemic preparedness, detection and response must rest,” he said.

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Abdulwahab said the scorecard would integrate key health security indicators into a single assessment tool to help governors monitor progress, identify gaps and strengthen accountability.

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“A core driver for our gathering today is the urgent need to establish a single, standardised health security governance assessment tool, the NGF Health Security Scorecard.

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“By harmonising disparate metrics into one unified instrument, we can eliminate fragmentation, reduce reporting fatigue and provide state governors and policymakers with clear, actionable insights to strengthen health security accountability across all 36 states,” he added.

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Abdulwahab said the scorecard would enable states to evaluate their current level of preparedness and use the findings to guide future policy decisions and investments.

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“The scorecard helps assess each state’s level of preparedness and provides the data needed for informed decision-making on priority actions and improvements,” he said.

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The Executive Director of Resolve to Save Lives Nigeria, Dr Nanlop Ogburuke, said the scorecard would strengthen disease preparedness, prevention and response at the sub-national level.

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“There is little that can be achieved without the states. Health security can only be effective when implemented at the sub-national level.

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“If we strengthen state capacities and empower leaders to make informed policy and investment decisions, we will be better positioned to prevent and respond to outbreaks such as cholera, Lassa fever, Ebola and other infectious diseases,” she said.

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Ogburuke noted that representatives from all 36 states and development partners were reviewing health security indicators and surveillance systems to ensure the scorecard reflected state-specific realities.

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The NCDC’s Dr Oyeladun Okunromade said the workshop was aimed at identifying gaps in state health security systems and establishing an accountability framework for tracking performance.

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“We are here to assess the gaps that exist at the state level and provide an accountability framework to track health security performance across the sub-national level,” she said.

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The World Bank’s Senior Health Specialist, Dr Chijioke Okoro, reaffirmed the bank’s commitment to supporting Nigeria’s efforts to strengthen its capacity to prevent, detect and respond to public health emergencies.

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He said sustainable disease control depended on building resilient health systems at the state level.

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Participants at the workshop agreed that the Health Security Scorecard would provide a comprehensive assessment of states’ preparedness using state-specific data while promoting accountability and advancing universal health coverage across the country.

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