FG must embrace private health sector — Private medical practitioners

“The Nigerian healthcare system is today like a house on fire and the occupants are stampeding to escape. Our doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers are abandoning their jobs and leaving the country for greener pastures abroad. This is the current most disturbing challenge to the health system after the very high cost of providing services that is not mostly paid for.

“I call on President Muhammadu Buhari to take urgent measures to halt this unchecked drift and save our healthcare system from total collapse; this is beyond political gimmickry, it calls for decisive action.”

These were the words of Dr Ugwu Iyke Odo, the national president of the Association of Nigerian Private Medical Practitioners (ANPMP) during the 44th annual scientific conference and annual general meeting of the association tagged Oluyole 2022, at the Jogor Centre, Ibadan.

Dr Odo said the strain of a harsh economy on medical practice in Nigeria has never been as constraining and as overbearing as it is in today’s extremely volatile economy and government policy that knows no exception, adding that “no health system succeeds this way and no economy develops this way.

“Our priorities must change and our conversations must shift to address the issues that matter the most. Every matter in the nation’s ecosystem matters but nothing matters and none should be made to seem to matter more than the life and health of the citizenry,” he stated.

According to the ANPMP president, the health-seeking behaviour of Nigerians is still very poor and in the face of these ambiguities, private doctors are struggling to cope and are rather perceived to be rich, adding that peoples’ perception of private doctors deserve a new baptism as the private doctor in Nigeria is left to struggle on his own, swimming against the vicious tide of maddening economic variables, making private doctors carry their cross at great cost.

He explained that a nation is as rich as the quality of the healthcare delivery available to its people as the disease burden of their populace determines its degree of poverty. He said, “the private sector is the face of healthcare in any healthcare compliant nation. In such climes, instituting the best practice standards and sustaining acceptable healthcare indices are the deliberate agenda of the government and the general system; these are the indicators of a healthy healthcare system.

“I, therefore, use this opportunity provided by this conference to call on our governments to open themselves to embrace the private health sector in collaboration and partnership, the possibilities in PPP should be maximized. This conference has given us the opportunity to re-explore our situation; the times are difficult and rough but in hope and determination, working together, investing into the common vision of supporting our country, our people will experience health and wellness and we will make a difference. The best healthcare systems in the world are built by men,” he added.

Speaking earlier, the chairman of the occasion, Kunle Kalejaye (SAN) lauded members of the association for their support and commitment to ensuring the profession is sanitised, commending them for allowing the law takes its course even when members of the association are found culpable.

He further enjoined them to take collective efforts in fighting quacks by sponsoring a bill that will curb the activities of quacks in the medical profession.