By Governor’s Press Unit.
Kitui County Executive Committee of Health and Sanitation Dr Winnie Kitute has today officially opened a six days’ training of healthcare workers.
Speaking while addressing the health care workers drawn from various Sub-counties in Kitui county, the County Executive Committee member said that the objective of the training is to build capacity of health care workers on maternal infant and young child nutrition.
“The main objective of this training is to build capacity of healthcare workers on maternal infant and young child nutrition in order to support nutrition education and counselling for mothers in our health facilities and at community level,” said Dr Kitute.
She further added that “this is governor’s pillar number one. Therefore, when food is given to our people and water is provided, definitely it will drip down to better health, whereby we are going to reduce more children who are malnourished and going to get mothers who are pregnant deliver health babies and lower the burden of diseases” she said.
Dr Kitute further said that this project was piloted in Kitui county in 2017, whereby its success guided the scale up in other four counties in Kenya. This include; Turkana, West Pokot, Marsabit and Kilifi.
Dr Kitute added that “In Kitui County the programme is being implemented in three sub-counties; Kitui South, Mwingi North, and Kitui Central, and that every household in the government’s cash transfer program and has a child aged below 15months and/or a pregnant would receive an additional Ksh 500 per beneficiary per month. Additionally, these beneficiaries will receive appropriate nutrition counselling on maternal infant and young child nutrition through the County’s health facilities and community health volunteers.
The program has benefitted over 2300 households across the three sub-counties but there are plans underway to extend the programme to other sub-counties in the county. The CEC added that the programme only benefits a household with a pregnant mother or a child below 15 months or both.
Through the Nutrition Improvement through Cash transfer and Health Education (NICHE) programme, the County has trained over ninety health care workers across various cadres. In addition, over 1500 Community Health Volunteers(CHVs) will be trained on the programme early next year who will be visiting the households within their vicinity.
The ministry of Health and Sanitation is implementing the Niche programme in conjunction with the national ministry of Public Service and Special Programmes, World bank and UNICEF.