FILE PHOTO: The Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) government complex is located in Cotabato City. Photo by Bong S. Sarmiento
COTABATO CITY — Bangsamoro health officials will establish 100 more barangay health stations (BHB) across the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) in a bid to ensure that people in their communities would have more access to health services. The planned project will cost P250 million.
BARMM Health Minister Dr. Rizaldy Piang said building more health stations would help answer the need for basic health services, especially among the region’s remote communities, whose residents may find it hard to travel to the nearest town.
“Our government is doing its work. It is responding to the needs of the Bangsamoro people, especially in the aspect of health,” Piang said in a radio interview on Monday, February 27.
She lamented that there are people in BARMM communities who fail to get the basic health services they deserve as they live far away from the town centers or due to decades of armed conflict. Piang gave assurance that her office would see to it that every Bangsamoro would not be deprived of access to basic health services anymore.
“From now on, we assure you that our health workers are ready to serve even the far-flung areas,” she added.
The BARMM Ministry of Health (MOH) turned over two of these newly-built health stations in the villages of Barorao in Balabagan town and Salamen in Kapatagan town of the province on February 23.
Piang said the barangay facilities, which cost P2.5 million each for the building and P500,000 for the equipment, were funded under the MOH’s Tiyakap Bangsamoro Kalusugan Program (TBKP).
Dr. Alinader Minalang, Integrated Provincial Health Officer II of Lanao del Sur, said they were committed to strengthening the health services in the province to ensure that no one would be left behind in terms of healthcare.
“The health station is a big help to our communities as this serves as an avenue for them to access the different health services from the government,” Minalang said, referring to services that included prenatal care and childbirth for pregnant women; immunization of infants, toddlers and school age children; medicines for common ailments; and health education being offered at the health stations.
In Saleman, a village of 1,637 people according to the 2020 Census, Barangay Captain Belal Beda said the children and pregnant women would benefit the most from the newly-built health station as their place is quite a distance away from the nearest hospital.
“This [health station] that they set up in our barangay is a very big help to us, especially among the children who easily get sick, and pregnant women no longer have to travel very far to the hospital,” she said. “That’s how important this facility is to us,” Beda added.
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