Not until you have cause to visit the hospital, be admitted or stay by the side of the sick- bed, only then you can appreciate the axiom that health is wealth.
There are instances when patients discharged from hospital are still found in hospital premises. It is not really on leisure grounds, excursion or a case of alternative home.
A case in point, which as a journalist and whistle blower deserves highlight and attention, is that of my ten-month old baby. She was on admission in a mission hospital. Diagnosed as suffering from gastroenteritis, pneumonia and high temperature, she was treated and dicharged after four days. I was charged the sum of close to N40, 000 including card, laboratory tests and ward incidentals. I afforded and paid it, not without a sledge-hammer effect, despondency and frustration.
Granted that efficient and professional health care delivery can not be divorced from a state of art equipment, granted too that many hands are at work, coupled with aesthetic, serene hospital environment to behold, which often must be translated and built into bills, a chunk of about N5, 000 of the N40, 000 bill designated to feeding for a ten-month suckling is less than normal.
We need to pause, ponder, read in between the lines, and be able to see the implications of astronomical bills on the psyche of majority of poor Imo People and other Nigerians.
As the situation stands now, except you are a millionaire, you have a piece of land, bungalow or other property to dispose off, admission in hospital involving operation or hospitalization for a month or thereabout definitely will cost a fortune.
It is rather unfortunate that going to hospital these days has become the last option, after the failure of self-help, self- medication, abuse and misuse of drugs.
Suddenly prayer houses have changed, their modus operandi, this time leading, masquerading as hospitals, and assuming responsibility in cases obviously and glaringly, within the purvey of medical experts. Some Nigerians even resort to patronizing herbal homes when they deserve orthodox medical attention, yet some are deluded into accepting the belief that their relation are responsible for their misfortune.
Equal opportunities, cheap, affordable quality health care services to the citizenry ought to be a right and not a privilege.
To start with, affirmative, pro-active and urgent action is needed. Mission hospitals in Imo State should be assisted through a well co-ordinated funding to encourage the hospitals to render cheap and affordable service, especially to children below the age of ten years. The Anambra State government is doing so presently. The Ebonyi State government has followed suit.
Primary health centres in the 27 local government Area Councils should assume full responsibility to cater for the health needs of their host communities with at least a resident doctor with state of art equipment in place.
The state owned general hospitals should be adequately funded, equipped with facilities to address referrals from the health centres. Of course a hungry and angry health worker constitutes a health hazard. Doctors must be the first line charge.
Time is often of essence in health care delivery. Beaurocracy and bottlenecks must be dismantled, if we are religiously committed to breaking even in the health sector. A situation whereby a patient in agony stays waiting for a doctor an hour does not speak well of our hospitals, worsened by the unhealthy and unethical conducts of nurses.
Our body needs various food nutrients through regular dietary regime. Unfortunately Nigerians are groaning and gnashing their teeth in hunger amidst affluence and a leadership that pretends all is well. Hunger-induced ill-health is increasing and devastating.
Let us rise to the occasion, banish rhetorics, do what is evidently correct and change the endemic system failure in the health sector.
Unequivocally, the government should first rehabilitate the old existing hospitals, build new ones, re-equip, and equip them with 21st century facilities to stem the unbridled tendency to resort to medical attention abroad.
Insiders have spoken. The Nigerian Medical Association, NMA, the various unions in the health sector have bare their minds, made their positions known and that remains point-blank the total overhaul of the health sector minus concessioning.
It is not as if the state-run hospitals are incapable, unqualified in handling our health challenges, the problem is that doctors are incapacitated, handicapped and frustrated.
Since patients are fundamentally central to health care services, the duty of the government, doctors, nurses and other health care deliverers is explicit and converges in the Holistic Health Care- a comprehensive approach to health care that implies body-mind-spirit consideration in all actions and interventions for the patient while recognizing the concept of the uniqueness of the individual and the influences of external and internal environmental factors on health.
Re: I Was Offered 3 Billion Naira To Impeach Okorocha
I noted with dismay the recent media publication credited to the Speaker of the Imo State House of Assembly Rt. Hon Benjamin Uwajumogu wherein the Speaker claimed that the Presidency , Chief Martin Agbaso, the PDP, Chief Emeka Offor and others offered him =N=3 billion in August 2012 to impeach Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State.
Every discerning Nigerian knows that the statement is a pure fabricated lie sponsored by Governor Okorocha and Uwajimogu to win public sympathy. Imo people are wiser, you fooled Imolites once in the case of Jude Agbaso, Uwajimogu you can’t fool us again.
It is however very unfortunate that a person occupying the exalted position of the Speaker of a State House of Assembly will cook up such a big lie in order to appear like a loyal servant to Governor Okorocha just to save his job.
One wonders how you, Benjamin Uwajimogu, that received alleged N150,000,000 to Impeach Jude Agbaso, will see N3B and look the other way.
Will a man as Uwajimogu, armed with a long list of impeachable offenses committed by Okorocha, see N3billion Naira and look the other way ?
Uwajimogu, please stop insulting the sensibility of Imo people. If you are looking for something to do, setup a committee to recover the entire sum paid to Jpros and bring all the culprits to book.
If you are looking for something to do, recommend the sack of Macdonald Akano for the role he played in the Jpros Scandal.
If you are looking for what to do, confront Imo state Government for the violation of CGC law by appointing CGC members instead of conducting CGC election as captured in IMHA CGC law, which you Uwajimogu and your House of Assembly Passed into law.
Uwajimogu If you don’t know what to do, set up a committee to look into the allegation that IMSU students are paying N20, 000 on top of the so called “100 % free education given to them”.
Uwajimogu if you are so idle and you don’t know what to do, setup another committee to investigate why monumental projects that have received 40% payment are yet to take off in Imo State.
If you are looking for what to do, setup a committee to investigate the over N38, 000,000 collected from CGC candidates by ISIEC last year without conducting any election.
Uwajimogu, If you are looking for what to do , setup a committee to investigate what Okorocha did with =N=13.3 Billion Bond Proceeds out of the N18.5 taken by the Imo State Government during Ohakim’s regime, =N=3 Billion SUBEB project account, =N=2.5 Billion Local Government Joint Project Account, =N=3.6 Billion left in JAAC Account by the previous administration, =N=488 Million in VAT account, More than N26.27 Billion of Local Government Allocations for 27 Local Government Areas in Imo State, =N=670 Million Imo children fund, etc. and make your findings public.
If you are looking for what to do, Uwajimogu, setup a committee to look into how Plots of Lands allotted to citizens of the State were revoked without due Process and lands belonging to communities appropriated to Okorocha’s Family Members, Associates and Friends using his son In-law,who he made Commissioner for Lands . Please make your findings public.
Uwajimogu, set up a committee to look into the use of ISOPADEC funds, if you don’t know what to do and make your findings public.
Uwajimogu, at the inception of this administration, Governor Okorocha told the whole world that he had ceded the state legislative quarters to Concorde Hotel Owerri and named it Concord Extension. Later, he renamed the place Luxury
Apartment and leased it his Special Adviser on Project Monitoring, Prince Macdonald Akano for 25 years, you kept mute.
Uwajimogu under your watch, Okorocha took all the world-class Printing and Sword Machines worth over 200 million naira (acquired by Mbakwe Administration) belonging to Imo Newspapers to Lagos for repairs and Sold them to his company Lamonde Press in Lagos at the paltry sum of =N=200,000.
Under our watch, a state Governor declared a Public Holiday and literally shut down the state for a week, just to celebrate his birthday, and wasted huge amount of state funds in the whole birthday jamboree.
Uwajimogu under your watch Okorocha used the state funds to build a private university in Ogboko under the pretence of relocating IMSU to Ogboko, you kept quiet.
Uwajimogu, under your watch people’s houses in Orlu, Owerri and Okigwe were demolished without compensation, you kept quiet.
Uwajimogu, under your watch, Okorocha reduced admission quota for Imo Indigenes in Imo State University and Imo State Polytechnics (IMSU) to 30%, Prof. B.E.B Nwoke even lost his job for daring to speak up against this policy, Uwajimogu you kept quiet.
Uwajimogu does it not border you that Okorocha is owing Retired Primary School Teachers who retired from 1991 till date 10 months arrears of pensions (these group of pensioners form 70% of the entire pensioners in Imo state) no gratuities and no hope to pay them in the next 2 years
Uwajimogu shouldn’t it be viewed as an act of wickedness against Imo people that you and your Assembly allowed the ceding of all the General Hospitals in Imo State to Okorocha’s Northern Nigerian associate for 15 years.
Uwajimogu, please where is the proceeds from the lease of Adapalm, ITC, General Hospitals , Concord Hotel etc?
Does it not bother Uwajimogu that the streets of Owerri are littered with abandoned city gates projects because the contractors handling those projects have not been paid?
Uwajimogu where were you when such a funny project was started in the first instance.
Has it not come to Uwajimogu’s notice that over 20 months arrears of pensions of retired staff of I.B.C have not been paid.
Uwajimogu, did you decide to turn a blind eye to these things because of the road contracts you are doing in the state or the ones you awarded even though the law does not permit you to exercise such powers?…. EFCC will soon open your case file.
Uwajimogu, Stop fooling yourself you and your entire assembly goofed, Imo people are wiser. You are simply looking for a story to justify your now ignoble action.
Sorry, Imo people now know the truth. Very soon it will be your turn to face the music.
