Members of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), Ogun State chapter, on Wednesday morning, protested against poor condition of service in the state health sector.
The doctors, led by its chairman, Dr Abayomi Olajide, bemoaned lack of medical equipments, personnel, infrastructure, drugs among others for efficient and effective service delivery.
The doctors were armed with placards with various inscriptions such as “We need Ogun standard health sector”, “Doctors dying of workload”, “Extreme manpower shortage”, “Bring back our interns and NYSC doctors”, stormed the Governor’s Office, Abeokuta, to present protest letter to Senator Ibikunle Amosun.
Olajide faulted Amosun for reneging on his campaign promises in 2011 of improving on the health sector, saying the promises are yet to be actualized six years after.
Olajide said, “NMA Ogun was highly supportive of your ascension into office in 2011. We’re inundated by your campaign promises of free and qualitative healthcare.
“Your promises is yet to be actualised in the health sector. The level of infrastructural decay ranging from dilapidated structures, obsolete equipment and poor drug supply chain.
“There is no single CT scan, Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) machine owned by the state. This negates the Ogun standard we all clamour for.
“The number of health workers in Ogun State is abysmally poor. We have less than 150 doctors manning over 40 health institutions in the state, which is half the population of the doctors manning FMC.”
Addressing the doctors, the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Mr Taiwo Adeoluwa, promised that government will invite the leadership of the association to a meeting within the next one month for consultations as a way of proffering solutions to all the identified challenges.
He admitted that government was aware of the challenges facing the doctors and the need to do more.
“We know there’s still a lot to do, but for the constraints of cash, which is not an excuse because health is very important to us,” Adeoluwa added.
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