Posted by In an effort to stamp out quacks and guarantee better service delivery, the federal government has promised to pass laws soon to regulate the healthcare industry.
While paying a courtesy visit to Prince Dapo Abiodun, governor of Ogun State, at the Presidential Lodge in Abeokuta on Friday, Minister of State for Health Dr. Tunji Alausa made the following statement.
Alausa slammed the unsavory habit of allowing individuals without proper training to work in the health field.
Additionally, he bemoaned the widespread presence of quacks, who are responsible for horrific acts like organ harvesting.
More than 60% of the country’s healthcare is provided by the private sector without sufficient oversight, so we will be advocating for new regulations to govern this industry, the minister said.
Illegal activities, such as organ harvesting, occur in hospitals, laboratories, and diagnostic centers since no one is monitoring their operations.
“States are expected to establish their own regulatory bodies in addition to the federal government’s Health Facility Regulatory Commission, which will begin to regulate the quality of health care nationwide.”
Additionally, Dr. Alausa has dropped hints that the federal government is launching a program to boost the supply of healthcare providers. This initiative would see an increase in the yearly intake of medical students from 28,000 to 68,000, and a rise in the annual intake of nursing students from 10,000 to 28,000.
The minister provided further details about President Bola Tinubu’s Sectoral Approach Programme, outlining how 1% of the total budget goes toward Basic Health Provision, 55% to Primary Healthcare Centres, 45% to National Health Insurance, and 5% to Emergency Services.
He urged the governor to keep a close eye on the Basic Health Provision Funds to make sure they flow to Primary Healthcare Centers, saying that Ogun State has been good with them.
Dr. Alausa said he was in Nigeria to study how the federal government is working with the states to implement the president’s order to improve the country’s healthcare system by reviving, reorganizing, assessing, and reworking it.
When asked about the federal government’s efforts to stamp out health care quackery, Governor Abiodun indicated his administration would gladly follow suit.
Rest assured, we will not hesitate to copy at the state level any regulations that will enable stronger regulatory functions over medical practitioners in order to combat quackery.
We recognized that many of our citizens, particularly pregnant women, are choosing traditional birth attendants, so we joined the other state that has established a board for alternative medicine. “To make sure we have some sort of control over their operations, we certify and regulate them,” Abiodun said.
He was overjoyed to hear that the federal government was considering expanding medical school enrollment to meet the demand for public health workers and promised that his state would do the same.
With the state serving as Nigeria’s industrial, educational, and religious center, Governor Abiodun emphasized the importance of having sufficient health facilities and trained personnel to offer healthcare services round-the-clock to the state’s residents. He pledged to back President Bola Tinubu’s administration’s plan to reshape the health sector.