Sir: I  recently  came  across  the blazing  headline  –  ‘’Nigeria  to import  doctors  from  Europe, United  States”  in  one  of  our  major newspapers  attributed  to Health  Minister Osagie Ehanire. What we currently have is export of Nigerian  doctors  to Europe  through  (IELTS, OET and PLAB) and to the United states (through USMLE). 

 

It may also interest our minister of health to know that we are also exporting our medical doctors through Prometric  examinations  to  Oman  and other Asian countries.The first question to ask is which hospital in Nigeria will the expatriate doctors  work?  Is  it  Aso  Rock  clinic  which our  out spoken  first  lady  once told  Nigerians,  in  2017,  had  no  syringes  letalone  an  Xray  machine?  Or  our  tertiary  hospitals  that  cannot  boast  of  24hours of power supply daily? How  many  times  has  the  minister paid  an  unscheduled  visit  to  our  tertiary  hospitals  after  2pm  during  weekdays  to  ascertain  the  states  of  laboratory  and  radiological  investigations?  Ineed  not  talk  of  what  happens  there during the weekends.

And who will provide security for the expatriate doctors?  Maybe the minister has not heard that a doctor on call in one of  the  tertiary  hospitals  was  once  kidnapped  right  inside  the  hospital. Her colleagues continued work the next day. Thank  God  she  was  later  released  and as usual, her family opted to remain silent on whether ransom was paid or not. And  how  much  will  the  expatriate doctors will be paid? Is it the so called CONMESS (Consolidated Medical Salary Scheme) which does not reflect the current  socio economic  realities? The minister needs to inform Nigerians how many radiotherapy machines that are working in this country before importing his expatriate doctors. If one does not have a cancer patient, one will not know what cancer patients are suffering in this country. 

 

Imagine a cancer patient travelling all the way from Cross River  state  to  Ibadan  for  radiotherapy and after surviving deaths on our death traps called federal high ways, the cancer patient would be told that the machine  was  faulty  hence  he  has  to  wait for  the  repair  or  move  to  Zaria  or  National Hospital Abuja for another marathon race.

 

No wonder a foreign journalist once described Nigerians as people that import  what  they  have  and  export  what they do not have. What our health sector needs is a complete  over haul  and  restructuring. Where is the motivation for the young doctors in Nigeria? Is the minister aware that  most  young  doctors after university stay at home for close to two years before securing a place to do the mandatory one year internship (housemanship)  programme?  Is  he aware  that  there  are  Nigerian doctors with primary results but cannot secure a place for residency programme? May be he is not aware that some chief medical  doctors of our tertiary  hospitals  are now using medical officers to replace resident doctors, a development Nigerians  will  soon  pay  dearly  for when it will be mandatory for every patient needing  specialist  care  to  travel abroad  to  meet  medical  specialists. What  happened  to  the muchtoutedcentral placement of house officers proposed  and  approved  by  his  predecessor or has that been jettisoned as usual?

 

I hope our minister will ask the expatriate doctors to come with their medical  equipment  because  it  is  not  exaggeration  to  say  that  some  of  the  Xray machines  we  have  in  the  country  are what Wil helm Conrad Röntgen, a German  mechanical  engineer and physicist,  used  on  8  November  1895  to  discover  Xrays or Röntgen rays. How  many  tertiary  hospitals  in  this country  can  boast  of  functional diagnostic machines like MRI, CT, PET scan machines  just  to  mention  but  a  few? Will  the  expatriate  doctors  agree  to work  with  our  current  doctor patient ratio  and  be  expected  to  perform optimally? Which foreign medical doctor  will  be  ready  to  consult  for  more than 100 patients during an out patient clinic day and will not run back to his country  the  next  day  because  that  is crazy  and  unimaginable? Instead of importing  doctors  into  the country,  the  government  should  sponsor our healthcare professionals abroad to learn certain procedures and how to operate  certain  medical  equipment. What  percentage  of  Nigeria’s  budget should  be  appropriated  to  our  health sector according to our National Health Act?  Has  that  percentage  been  implemented  in  this  country?  Even  at  that there is no effective mechanism to check the diversion of the paltry sum released into these hospitals into private pockets. Let the  minister look into the  health sector holistically instead of playing to the gallery.

 

There is a limit to politicking,  and  human  lives  should  not  be used to score political points.

 

By Dr Paul John,

Port  Harcourt.