Senate on Tuesday directed the Federal Ministry of Health to set up an efficient and proper mechanism to identify and prevent merchants of fake medical reports, a dangerous trend in public hospitals.
The upper legislative chamber also urged the Nigerian Medical Association to intensify its efforts in checking indices of fraud and quackery in the medical profession, especially in public hospitals.
Senate directive followed the motion by Senator, Uche Ekwenife, Anambra Central (APC), on the danger of the proliferation of fake medical report emanating from public hospitals in Nigeria.
The Anambra Central Senator had said that a recent investigation revealed that the ease with which “authentic” medical reports can be obtained from some public hospitals in Nigeria for a fee without requiring any medical test was worrisome and undermines the nation’s medical report integrity.
In his intervention on the debate of the motion Senator Patrick Moro, Benue South (PDP) said the Senate was worried at the commercialization of medical reports which posed a grave danger for the nation’s medical health and safety of the citizen.
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According to him, the judiciary relies on medical reports in some of its judgement in cases bordered on criminality but this situation where medical reports have become commercialized then it would undermine the integrity of such judgements and possibly lead to the death of an innocent man.
He noted that it used to be an issue of fake drugs which posed danger to the health of the people in the nation but a combination of both leaves health consequences that can only be imagined.
Both Senator representing Abia Central, Senator Theodore Orji and Senator Sunday Onor, Cross River Central (PDP) said this development speaks to the integrity of the nation on and must be guarded against.
Orji said it damages the image of the nation in the comity of nations.
Onor who said the motion brings to the fore the need for professionalism noted that where a Nigerian seeks medical attention abroad but ends up having a report that is radically different from the diagnosis in the hospital outside the country speaks to who the Nigerian patient was and the nation too.
He said something must be done by the appropriate authority in the nation to make sure that medical reports from the government hospitals are professionally authoritative and genuinely so.
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