Recently, at a conference on health, President Goodluck Jonathan raised alarm at the huge capital flight from the country through the upsurge in medical tourism among Nigerians. The President’s lamentation smacks of insincerity as medical tourism is just one area where the shortcomings in our national life have caused the nation a lot.
Does the President not know of education tourism and the fact that Nigeria over the years has become an open education market where delegations from foreign countries frequent three times a year to recruit Nigerian students for schooling in foreign countries including neighbouring African countries?
The question is, ‘ in the more than five years he has been in power with his transformation agenda, has there been a marked reduction in the number of Nigerian students seeking overseas education because of dwindling standards and facilities at home?
In view of the importance of good health, if a country’s health facilities are below standard and specialist health services are unavailable, it is natural to expect that the privileged would seek life-saving health services wherever they. It is for this reason that those Nigerians who are sick and lucky to have the means to seek medical attention have been travelling to Europe, America, India, South Africa and even Ghana in search of cure for their ailments.
A lot is wrong with health services in the country. Aside the recurring problem of strikes by workers which afflict the health sector, quality and standards are also low, because the quality of personnel would depend on the quality of education. Second, investment in the sector to improve facilities has been very low. Even under the Jonathan administration, very little money is voted for the maintenance and operation of the nation’s hospitals compared to that for a high class medical facility in the Presidential Villa!
Why should the best medical facility in the country be at the Presidential Villa to serve a select few while the other 160 million Nigerians are forced to manage poorly-maintained hospitals?
In many countries where Nigerians run to for medical attention, university teaching hospitals are the apex medical institutions which treat all strata of the society including the leadership of the country. In Nigeria, being a leader or top shot means that when the fellow has malaria or headache, he should be flown to Germany or somewhere in the UK.
Medical tourism has come to stay and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Just like in the case of education tourism which costs Nigeria billions annually, it is those countries that take the health of their people serious that would reap the benefits. Quality and reliable health system, like education system, does not take root overnight. It is the result of careful planning, commitment and good leadership that abhors corruption and nepotism.
For example, as an educated man which his admirers say set him apart from previous Nigerian leaders, what stopped President Jonathan to site one high quality medical facility a year in any part of the country as a way to turn the fortunes of the nation’s health sector around? By today, we would have had five of such facilities and in the interim such facilities could be managed in collaboration with expert foreign medical personnel while plans are put in place to train Nigerians to take over from them through intensive local and foreign training.
Nigerians are tired of their leaders shedding crocodile tears about the poor situation of things in the country whereas these so-called leaders have the mandate to turn things around.
