Will COVID-19 Push Nigerian Leaders To Address Health Crisis?

By Chuks Ekpeneru

As Nigerians mourn the late Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari, the Secretary to Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha has come under a barrage of questions over his statement that he was not aware of the bad state of the nation’s healthcare until the Coronavirus pandemic.

Though he has come out to clarify the statement, the weight of the message is not lost on discerning Nigerians.

The truth is that if the rampaging Covid-19 was not a global issue, Nigerian leaders would not have paid much attention to this matter, because they would have relocated in droves to countries with adequate health facilities.

Just recently, a Nigerian residing in Saudi Arabia raised the alarm over the relocation of Nigerian doctors to that country.

He told GreenWhiteGreen that about 200 Nigerian doctors moved to Saudi Arabia within the past three months.

This alarming statistics is corroborated by the President, Nigeria Medical Association (NMA), Dr. Francis Faduyile, who said that only 42,000 doctors out of the 75,000 registered by the association were available for Nigeria’s 200 million population.

Faduyile said the remaining 33,000 have left for greener pastures, adding that Nigeria has one of the worst health indices in the world.

He attributed the emigration of Nigerian doctors to high rate of insecurity, poor job satisfaction, low remuneration, unemployment, bad roads, and poor healthcare system.

According to him, “In rural areas, we have one doctor to 22,000 people, while in towns and cities, we have one doctor to 10,000 Nigerians or one doctor to 12,000 Nigerians, whereas the World Health Organisation (WHO) said for any country to have a balanced ratio, it must have one doctor to 600 persons.

“Nigerian doctors and other healthcare workers, including nurses and pharmacists, are leaving the country in droves because of the poor healthcare system and lack of job satisfaction,” he added.

The endemic poblems of inaccessibility of quality health care, poor hygiene, corruption, lack of access, poor health infrastructure, fake drugs, insufficient financial investment, and lack of sufficient health personnel did not start today.

Despite huge budgetary allocations, not much has changed in the nation’s public health sector. The solutions proffered by the leadership has also not been deep rooted.

The trend has always been to rush outside the country, for even just minor medical check up.

In 2019, Minister of State for Health, Osagie Ehanire, lamented the spate of medical tourism abroad by Nigerians.

He said Nigeria was at that time losing more than $1 billion dollar yearly to medical service sourced abroad by Nigerians.

According to him, the increase in medical tourism was a declaration of no confidence in the nation’s health system.

President Muhammadu Buhari may be aware of the problem in the sector as he recently appealed to workers in the health sector to bear with the administration in their demands as it braces up for the challenges posed by coronavirus to the economy.

He made the appeal when workers in the health sector the under the auspices of Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU) and Assembly Healthcare Professionals Associations (AHPA) paid him a courtesy call at the State House, Abuja. He assured that government was looking into their issues with a view to resolving them.

“Your case is certainly receiving attention, but you must bear in mind the condition that the country is in now. Coronavirus is not improving matters. It is affecting what we very much depend on, the petroleum industry and therefore revenue,” he said.

With some people in leadership affected by the Coronavirus, it is hoped that the nation’s leaders will be jolted to take a sincere look into the health system in the country and do the needful.

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