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The following day, the Health Services Division asked all civil surgeons to take over the centres from the authorities concerned by April.
The Tk 1,209 crore second phase of UPHCSDP began in 2018 and ended in December last year.
During the 2023-24 fiscal year, 8.37 lakh women received maternal services, including antenatal and postnatal care. Over 4 lakh children received treatment for diarrhoea, measles, respiratory diseases, and malnutrition during the period, according to the LGD’s 2023-24 annual report.
After the project’s expiry, city corporations and municipalities have been continuing services with support from NGOs.
The 23 municipalities include Sirajganj, Kushtia, Gopalganj, Kishoreganj, Faridpur, Shariatpur, Netrokona, Kurigram, Gaibandha, Jagannathpur, Derai, Benapole, Tarabo, Laksam, Pirganj, Cox’s Bazar, Jamalpur, and Patuakhali.
However, health experts say primary healthcare services remain relatively weak in the urban areas, forcing people to rely on curative care amid a growing urban population.
“This is definitely the right decision to hand over,” said Aminul Hasan, member secretary of the UHC Forum, a platform of health professionals and activists working towards universal health coverage (UHC).
“One of the major challenges in our health service delivery, particularly in urban health, has been governance. The health ministry oversees almost everything except urban health. Bringing this under the ministry would improve coordination and implementation,” he told The Daily Star yesterday.
Responding to a question about managing a large number of facilities amid manpower shortages in the health department, he said, “There are, of course, management issues.”
“While this will certainly be a challenge, I believe coordination will ultimately improve if challenges can be addressed properly.”
The Prime Minister’s Office in March formed a nine-member committee, led by the cabinet secretary, to review UPHCSDP and assess the possibility of handing over its infrastructure to the health ministry, sources said.
The April-22 meeting was chaired by LGRD State Minister Mir Shahe Alam. He told teh meeting that the centres should be handed over to the health ministry, documents show.
Upon taking charge of the facilities, the health authority will operate, maintain, and repair them, the documents said, directing the authorities concerned to complete the handover by April.
Talking to this correspondent on Tuesday, Dhaka Civil Surgeon Mohammad Zillur Rahman said they already wrote to the two city corporations to hand over some 45 facilities.
Authorities of the city corporations are preparing checklists of equipment and other materials before formally handing them over, he added.
The facilities continue to provide services, and to keep them operational without disruption, the city corporations have sought an inter-ministerial meeting to resolve outstanding issues, Zillur said.
Contacted yesterday, Jahane Ferdous Binte Rahman, chief health officer of Dhaka South City Corporation, said they already sent a list of their facilities to the Dhaka Civil Surgeon’s Office.
She added that the health ministry has called a meeting on the issue today and hoped that everything would be clarified there.
On May 4, the ministry asked the Directorate General of Health Services to submit a report outlining the manpower, medical equipment, and other requirements needed to make those facilities functional, said ministry officials.
It sought details on the services that can be provided, the staffing structure for each centre, and the condition of the physical infrastructure, including the estimated repair and renovation costs needed to make them operational.
Speaking to this newspaper, Health Secretary Quamruzzaman Chowdhury said they were taking over the facilities following the PM’s directives.
Replying to a question, he said they may retain existing manpower, apart from recruiting new staffers to operate the facilities. “Our aim is to improve primary healthcare in urban areas to reduce dependency on secondary and tertiary hospitals.”