Responsible governments all over the world place high premium on the health of their citizenry.
It is the least expected of them really, because only a healthy populace can grow an economy and so, build a nation.
But there exist governments that are irresponsible in this wise. Sadly, their despicable excuses range from lack of adequate funding, inadequate skilled manpower, and so on.
Say what one may about the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, Barrister Nyesom Wike, -the jury is still out on that anyway-,the health sector of the nation’s capital appears to be experiencing supreme glory presently.
Keen watchers of FCT Administration (FCTA) events point to his appointment of two passionate and competent medics, Dr Adedolapo Fasawe and Dr Babagana Adam, as Mandate Secretary and Permanent Secretary, respectively, for FCT’s Health Services and Environment Secretariat (HSES) as reason for the fresh mark-up in health accomplishments to FCT residents.
While the emplacing of both competent, experienced pilots — affectionately dubbed outside of FCTA’s gates as ‘The Doctoring Twins’ –is important, it is what such do with the assignment(s) handed them that speak(s) volumes.
Against the backdrop of the dire socio-economic situation in the land, with palpable adverse impacts on majority of the citizenry, it is a given now that it has become costly -indeed, very costly -to become sick.
It is a fickle finger of fate that most ordinary citizens fervently pray and fast against.
What with hunger ravaging and pillaging the masses amid high inflationary spirals, an affliction of illness is one burden too many to bear for the ordinary Nigerian.
Obviously bearing this in mind, the FCTA recently embarked on several welfare measures to mitigate the impact of economic anomie on residents of the nation’s capital territory.
One of these was the disbursement of about one million malaria-preventive drugs for children in the FCT.
Apparently shifting the trajectory of the dangling orb of doom from parents, who are already thoroughly harassed by the sting of tormenting financial problems in the country, the Administration paid its counterpart funding for an Islamic Development Bank (IDB) grant.
This step unlocked the FCT’s access to the anti-malarial medication, which were subsequently distributed free in a bold bid to reduce child mortality.
Additionally, FCTA also paid the sum of $100,000 counterpart funding which opened the doors to an extra N900million from IDB.
The objective of the latter action was to ensure that no patient within FCT pays for malaria treatment -a development that is subsisting.
It appears even initial opponents to Wike’s appointment have softened up as a visit to any of the General Hospitals in the nation’s capital shows a remarkable increase in patients ferried in from contiguous states who have come to drink from the sumptuous fountain of FCTA’s health strides.
The states include Niger, Kaduna, Nasarawa, Plateau, Bauchi, Kogi, and as far away as Kwara and Ondo.
One of the visiting patients, Malam Isa Audi, who said he hails from Niger state, was spotted in General Hospital, Asokoro, one of the flagships of such facilities in FCT.
He arrived in company with his wife, Mallama Maimuna Audi, and two of their children –Auwalu, aged 5, and Shehu, aged 3.
Both children were visibly shivering from a cold even as nurses attended to them after they had been ushered into a medical doctor’s office for diagnosis.
One of the nurses was seen handing the parents some anti-malarial drugs.
At the end of proceedings, the following conversation was recorded:
‘’Nawa ne za mu biya (how much do we pay)?’’, Malam Audi asked, worry clearly etched on his greasy, furrowed brows as he expected a Mount Everestine figure to be mentioned.
‘’Kyauta ne, Malam. Gwamnati ta biya muku (It’s free, Malam. Government has paid for you)’’, the nurse replied, a smile playing on her lips as she moved on to attend to the next set of patients.
Audi’s face lit up in a huge smile.
Gauging his visage earlier on, it would not be out of place to say this may have been the best piece of news he has received recently.
Gathering the many folds of his babanriga, he stood up and began to exit, his beleaguered family in tow.
In his thoughts: this totally unexpected, unspent change in the pocket will go into food purchase for the iyali (family) once he gets home.
As Audi made his way out through the hospital, he told his wife that there was need to inform as many of their family and friends as possible of the health ‘goodies’ in FCT.
The policy formulation that led to all these was given life at a recent event where medical commodities were presented to FCTA-owned hospitals.
Here, Dr Fasawe explained that FCTA was prompted to use a preventive approach to tackle the malaria challenge as statistics had shown that 10 children die of the ailment every second in Africa.
According to her, alongside the one million doses of malaria-preventive medication, a project was underway to support hospitals and communities with staffing and location health advocacy.
Dr Fasawe, who was flanked by Dr Adam, admonished mothers to be on the alert because they had a big role to play in ensuring their children received the medication, revealing that health workers would be afoot all over FCT to distribute the medication to children aged under five.
The Mandate Secretary urged mothers not to reject the health personnel, imploring them to rather welcome them and use the drugs as directed.
But she warned against consumption of the drugs by pregnant women or adults.
As we write, health personnel have been going from doorstep to doorstep of individual homes administering the anti-malarial medications free of cost.
The exercise ends in November this year.
Not done, the FCTA also signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with a reputable firm, NISA Premier Medical Group, popularly known as Garki Hospital, to promote affordable, accessible and sustainable healthcare delivery for FCT residents.
It is a Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) arrangement designed to complement government’s bid to achieve Universal Health Coverage (UHC).
The MoU will bring world-class, quality health care delivery much closer to the people, especially those covered by health insurance scheme, which in FCT goes for as low as N1000 monthly.
Replete with latest gadgets of medical technology, it is a verifiable open secret that FCTA-owned General Hospitals host millions of patients streaming in from outside the nation’s capital.
Now, as in the foreseeable future, it is possible that despite the storms of battle he is fighting with prominent politicians, Wike’s health sector deeds could sow the seeds of a huge legacy which generations will not forget in a hurry.
*Felix Durumbah, MNUJ, is an Abuja-based newspaper editor, commenter on government affairs and public policy strategic analyst. Reachable on:fdurumbah@yahoo.com
