LAGOS STATE GOVERNMENT REFUNDS 145 FORMER SUBSCRIBERS OF EGAN HOUSING ESTATE
admin Lagos State government has hinted of plans to establish the Lagos State Essential Medicines Agency (LSEMA) to ease the management and distribution of essential medicines within the state.
Commissioner for Health Prof. Akin Abayomi stated this during the ongoing ministerial press briefing to mark the first year of Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s second term in office.
According to Prof. Abayomi, the initiative is also a response to the Federal Government’s mandate for every State to set up a Drug Management Agency (DMA) to combat drug scourge.
He said: “This agency is designed to address significant challenges in the supply chain by introducing a structured and technologically driven approach to the procurement, storage, and distribution of health commodities. The LSEMA is being established in response to the inefficiencies observed in the existing drug supply chain, which includes poor inventory management, inadequate staffing, and sub-optimal financial performance.
“The agency aims to overhaul this system by implementing a centralised framework that ensures the quality, availability, and timely delivery of health commodities across the state. A cornerstone of the agency’s strategy is the adoption of digital tools to enhance inventory management, streamline logistics, and improve the tracking of drugs. This includes setting up an ICT backbone to support operations from a central store to zonal distribution points, ensuring that all processes are monitored and managed efficiently.”
“The LSEMA will leverage Public-Private Partnerships to enhance operational capacities. This approach will combine public oversight with private sector efficiency and creativity, particularly in areas such as logistics and the day-to-day management of drug supplies. The agency will act as a regulatory body to ensure that all essential medicines distributed within the state meet strict quality standards. This will involve close cooperation with national regulatory bodies like the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC).”
The commissioner also noted that the government is working to ensure a full digitization of the health sector. “In the next few weeks, we will begin the acceleration of this process to digitise the public health sector in the first phase. So far, we have successfully attained data protection compliance in line with federal regulations on data security.
“We’ve already started significant planning and, in the next couple of weeks, we’ll roll out the Smart Health Information Platform (SHIP) which will be the connectivity between all our public health facilities. Every general hospital, PHC and other government facilities will have interconnectivity so that your electronic medical records or any other data that is important to you as a patient is available and accessible at any point in time, wherever you are presenting yourself, under very strict cyber security rules and guidelines. SHIP is designed to streamline healthcare processes by establishing a unified platform that supports data-driven decision-making and enhanced efficiency of healthcare delivery. It will enable better patient management, reduce redundancy, and ensure that health resources are utilised optimally.
“This is going to be revolutionary for us; it will speed up the way we manage health care in Lagos and give us access to real time data on the health-seeking behaviour of Lagosians.”
Prof. Abayomi added that the free health mission announced by Governor Sanwo-Olu as part of the palliatives to cushion the economic challenges will start next week across the three senatorial districts of the state.
