Community health volunteers in Nairobi will receive medical cover and training if a Bill before the county assembly becomes law.
The Nairobi City County Health Services Bill also seeks to certify the health workers.
The Bill requires the county government to make arrangements for the training and certification of the volunteers using an approved curriculum.
“The Nairobi county government through its executive should, therefore, implement programs to train and certify the volunteers using an approved curriculum,” reads the Bill in part.
The Bill, sponsored by Zimmerman MCA Pius Mbono, has gone through the first reading.
The county government will be required to pay the volunteers a stipend as well as contributions to National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF).
But this will on apply to the volunteers who attain at least 80 per cent of their performance target.
Last month, the county government announced the monthly stipend for health volunteers will be increased to Sh3,000 from Sh1,300.
In addition each will get at Sh500 every month for NHIF cover.
Nairobi has about 6,250 community health workers in more than 1,000 health centres across the 85 wards.
Health volunteers visit homes to determine the health situation, promote appropriate home-based care for the sick, trace and refer health-related cases to the nearest facilities and mobilize community members to adopt health promotion practices.
Before devolution, the national government used to train the volunteers.
The proposed law will compel City Hall to establish community health units to improve services.
"The health units through their volunteers will be able to give reports to alert the county in time in case of an outbreak to prevent further spread of a disease,” Mbono said.
