BLATANTLY playing to the gallery, the Federal Government is about to recruit and send 74 of Nigeria’s medical specialists to Guinea-Bissau. Already, the Technical Aid Corps Directorate has issued a recruitment notice to this effect, stating that the appointments would be for two years in the first instance. Seeing the severe health risks confronting Nigerians at home, this is a reckless and unthinkable aid, an unnecessary denial of Nigeria’s decrepit health system.

It is a noble cause for countries to help other countries out, but the idea of sending medical specialists from Nigeria to Guinea-Bissau at this time is provocative, and completely misplaced. Indeed, it is an awful pretence of Nigeria’s domestic health miasma in which the President, Major-General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), headlines with his insensitive resort to medical vacations in England. Certainly, Nigeria itself needs medical assistance from other countries.

The notice from the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria states that TAC requires specialists in obstetrics and gynaecology, pulmonology, cardiology, neurology, general surgery, nephrology, urology, ophthalmology, and gastroenterology, among others for recruitment. This beggars belief primarily because these specialists are in short supply.

Currently, healthcare delivery in Nigeria is in the doldrums. Among other issues, Nigeria has a doctor-patient ratio of 1:5,000, one of the worst globally. This contrasts sharply with the 1:1,600 doctor-to-patient ratio recommendation of the World Health Organisation. Producing only 3,000 medical graduates annually, the National Universities Commission says that Nigeria has a 300,000 medical doctors’ shortfall. Conversely, India attained the 1:1,000 ratio in 2018, the country having over 460 medical training institutions. Cuba has a ratio of 1:155, the highest in the world. This is the kind of country that can send doctors overseas, not struggling Nigeria.

The acute personnel deficiency shows vividly in the agony patients seeking medical treatment undergo in Nigeria. The rural areas are the worst hit from the dearth of doctors. Amidst this, doctors and other health care professionals regularly embark on strikes. The National Association of Resident Doctors was on strike between August and September. Since last year, Nigeria – like other countries – has been enveloped by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and outbreaks of cholera, meningitis, diarrhoea, and Lassa fever. Nigeria accounts for 23 per cent of malaria deaths, estimated by the WHO at 409,000 in 2019.

For a country that is shorthanded in practically every area of specialisation, the policy to send specialists to Guinea-Bissau is not well-thought-out. For the sake of the suffering citizens, it should be reversed. The risk of dying from diseases in Nigeria is high. To treat cancer, the country has fewer than 70 oncologists. With 332 cardiologists currently registered on its books, the ratio worked out to 1:581,000 people in 2018. As of 2016, Nigeria had just 130 urologists. It is a slap on the face of the citizens therefore that Nigeria is about to deplete this number through a thoughtless government policy.

As grim as the health sector is, there is a prevalence of brain drain. Medical professionals seek pastures anew constantly because of the poor remuneration and lack of facilities at home. In August, the federal authorities cancelled an interview by Saudi Arabia to recruit Nigerian doctors in Abuja, although doctors and consultants had been recruited in Lagos. There are an estimated 5,000 and 4,000 Nigerian doctors practising in the United States and Canada, respectively. No fewer than three medical professionals dump Nigeria weekly for overseas jobs. It misses the point to intimidate doctors from electing to go and practise in Saudi Arabia or Europe only to send them to Guinea-Bissau a few months later.

Consequently, the rich, including the President, prefer to go overseas to meet their health needs. A report said Nigerians spend $2 billion annually on overseas medical tourism, particularly to India. It makes no sense that Nigeria, which needs help, is simultaneously jeopardising its domestic health sector.

Habitually disposed to an Afro-centric policy, Nigeria might not be able to completely abjure aiding other countries in the continent. Over time, the Federal Government has played the ‘big brother’ role well, especially in financial assistance, and police/military peace-keeping forces in Africa. On occasions, Buhari has sent financial assistance to Guinea-Bissau. He gave over N500 million to the country between 2018 and 2019, some of it to conduct elections. This is a good way to help. Military assistance is another way the President can offer aid.

But as good as these causes are, the policy has backfired in several ways. In Ghana, Nigerian traders have been up against the authorities there, who are demanding huge sums before they (the Nigerians) can do business. A few days to the 1976 Montréal Olympic Games, Nigeria led 27 other African countries to boycott the Games in protest of apartheid in South Africa and a tour of the New Zealand’s rugby team to the then apartheid enclave, a sign of Nigeria’s massive role in ending apartheid. These days, the South Africans seem to have forgotten all that, as xenophobic attacks occur periodically against Nigerians.

All this points to an incoherent foreign policy in government. It should teach the Nigerian government that there is a limit to giving help to other countries, especially when the country itself cannot boast of an efficient health sector. As the old saying goes, charity should always begin at home. In this case, the best policy is centred on the health needs of the citizens. The Buhari regime should place priority on Nigerians’ health needs.

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