25,000 pharmacists to over 200 million Nigerians insufficient — Expert

THE Head of Pharmacy Department, Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital, Ado Ekiti, Olusola Ojo, has called on pharmacists in Nigeria to collaborate to be able to meet the country’s health needs.

Ojo, who said that Nigeria had grossly insufficient pharmacists going by recent reports that the country with a population of over 217 million people had 25,000 pharmacists, said, “It is time for pharmacists in Nigeria to come together to bridge the gap in the interest of health for all.”

The former chairman, Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria, Ekiti State branch, spoke at a sensitisation lecture organised by Afe Babalola University’s College of Pharmacy and the Pharmacy Department ABUAD Multi-System Hospital, Ado Ekiti.

He said that for Nigeria to meet the average global health standard, “the current number of pharmacists in Nigeria must be quadrupled.”

He said that the recent and continuous assault on global health by COVID-19 and other epidemics, the preponderance of communicable and non-communicable diseases, dwindling world economy, unfriendly changing world climate and environmental pollution “send warning signals that healthcare providers must unite in action to safe the human race.”

According to him, “The whole essence of pharmaceutical practice is ensuring availability of medicines, access and use at the individual and population levels. The much-needed unity in the action of pharmacists for a healthy population of whatever magnitude is creating a collaborative continuum in research, development, formulation, distribution, access and clinical use of medicines.”

ABUAD founder, Aare Afe Babalola, who lauded pharmacists for their contributions to a healthy world, urged them not to rest on their oars but to continue to research and come out with further breakthroughs.

Babalola said that his university, at the peak of COVID-19, embarked on research on a vaccine to cure the virus in its quest to prove the effectiveness of African medicine and came up with ABUAD Herbal Virucidine, which he described as “an immune booster to combat COVID-19 pandemic.”

“I believe that local herbs have the power to combat the pandemic. That’s why I worked with some scientists in the institution to actualise this dream and I am happy to tell you that it has been approved by the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control,” he said.

The provost, ABUAD College of Pharmacy, Professor Mbang Femi-Oyewo, said the programme was to increase awareness among pharmacists and as well celebrate them and their contribution to the health sector in the country.