Ex- Ministers proffer solutions to Nigeria’s healthcare challenge

Two former Nigeria’s Ministers of Health, Prof. Babatunde Osotimehin and Mrs Adenike Grange, have advised Nigeria on ways to overcome its current healthcare challenges.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Osotimehin and Grange spoke at an award dinner organised by the Nigeria Health Foundation (NHF) in Newark on Saturday night.

They said that Nigeria was blessed with human and material resources to provide quality health care to all citizens through the states and local councils.

“With regards to health, one of the major structural defects which we have not addressed, is the fact that healthcare belongs to communities; it does not belong to a government.

“Government of course would bring resources to make sure it works, but it belongs to communities. As Minister of Health, that was something that I observed clearly.

“If you want healthcare to work well, then you must empower the states and local governments in Nigeria to deliver care to their people.

“There’s no care that can be addressed, envisioned or directed from Abuja because it just would not work.”

He gave statistics of the resources of the ministry during his tenure as minister and the responsibilities it had, which prevented it from making much impact at the grassroots.

“The Federal Ministry of Health is a Class ‘A’ Ministry and so they give us resources; it is one of the biggest Ministries in the Federal Government.

“They give us resources to be able to do those things which you are supposed to do; but 85 per cent of the money we get in the Ministry of Health goes to running Teaching Hospitals.

“Teaching Hospitals are not there to serve the common man, and at a time there were about 52 of them,’’ the former minister explained.

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Grange, in her speech, explained that she created a Desk for doctors and nurses in Diaspora so as to harness their potential for the development of the country’s healthcare.

The former minister advised the ministry to utilise the desk for the benefit of Nigeria’s health sector.

“When I was Minister of Health, I decided that we needed to have Desks for the diaspora doctors and nurses, and the desk is still there.

“The whole idea was that those doctors and nurses who are in Diaspora have so much energy, so much knowledge; and you want them to get home and help out.

”This your vision is something that will go far.’’

NAN reports that since its inception, NHF was involved in resolving the health challenges of rural Nigerian through its annual healthcare outreach.