Former Ekiti Governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi has suggested that to discourage mass migration of medical personnel to foreign countries, the Federal Government must demand the cost of training the migrants as a cost of substitution.

The former Governor also suggested that a national scheme should be instituted to engage newly licensed health workers for a fixed period to make the medical personnel brain drain unattractive to Nigerian professionals.

Fayemi spoke on Thursday in a keynote address at an induction retreat of the commissioner of health with the theme: ‘Navigating health leadership from promise to impact’ in Abuja.

He said: “Any countries coming to recruit doctors or health workers from Nigeria must pay for the training of the substitution of outgoing candidates.

“For countries that want to come and recruit doctors from Nigeria, or health workers, you should pay for the training of the substitution.

“I’m worried about the entire health resource force that we have not just doctors, you must pay us. I would say the equivalent of training two doctors if you are taking one doctor out of our system.

“It is like tree planting. You go into the forest, when you do deforestation, afforestation must be followed and afforestation must be encouraged.

“In fact, to regulate afforestation, for every tree you caught, you must replace it with two trees planted. You must give enough funding for training those two doctors,” he said.

To further strengthen the nation’s health care service delivery, Fayemi implored the Federal Government to establish a National Health Service Scheme that would ensure a minimum standard before they can embark on leaving the country to engage their services abroad.

“For health workers, we have trained, there will be some kind of scheme, like the National Health Service scheme for newly licensed health workers that would enable them to spend some time in a fixed period not limitless from three to five years.

“Whilst you’re doing that your license is held by the Nigerian Dental and Medical Council or a regulatory body that gives you that licence and once you’re done, you can decide you want to stay or you want to leave,” he added. (The Nation)

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