The Plight Of The Nigerian Doctor
Nigeria is the only country where one is expected to perform optimally while in one of the harshest environments. I was at a function recently in Illinois, USA when an American soldier walked in with his uniform. Everybody in the gathering stood up in reverence to the soldier. For about five minutes, I was confused and surprised. I was aware that we were not expecting a guest in the gathering but while the drama unfolded, I learnt that they normally reverence their military officers who lay down their lives for the defence of America.
I was shocked to the marrow. I reminisced how at times our own soldiers in this part of the world would be standing on the road waving to motorists in order to hitch a ride to their destinations,but our drivers going in the same direction as the soldiers would blatantly refuse to help out and we still want them to lay their lives for the defence of our territories ? That is the pathetic Nigerian story.These soldiers die that we may live.
Today, every Nigerian wants the Nigerian medical doctors to perform like their counterparts in the USA,UK etc without bringing down the working conditions and remuneration packages obtainable there to our own country. It is indisputable that the efficiency of labour is determined by two major factors, an optimal working condition and good remuneration. Who bothers to compare the salaries, per annum, of American doctors and those in Nigeria here. I was in a restaurant recently were bank officials, next to me, were discussing the money paid to doctors, one was saying that she thought doctors were being paid millions of naira until she was in the unit that processes the payment of salaries for doctors. They said all sorts of things. I kept quiet after all nobody knew my identity. These bankers were aware that we are being paid peanuts because they had the opportunity of perusing our salary schedule , what of an average Nigerian out there who erroneously believes that we are paid millions as our salaries hence everybody in the family (including extended family) resorts to us for any financial help and if we dare say no,the tales will be steeped in intrigue and spiced with oral acrobatics.
To an average Nigerian, doctors are humanitarian workers. Yes, I accept that obvious fact but we are not living in houses donated by humanitarian governments/agencies, our children don't go to schools built by humanitarian agencies where tuition fees would be free. We don't drive humanitarian cars and when we or our spouses go to the market to buy things, we are not given what we want so that humanitarian government can pay for us later. We live like other Nigerians and when we issue cheques to people if they bounce due to insufficient funds in our accounts ; we are also liable to criminal prosecutions just like other Nigerians.
When I worked as an adhoc member of Ebola Operation Centre, Port Harcourt during the 2014 Ebola epidemic, we saw how the representatives of WHO, who were the 'real' humanitarian workers,were hosted. They never lodged in one of the cheapest hotels; they did not eat the cheapest food because they were humanitarian workers.They moved with posh cars .
They enjoyed the best form of life one could enjoy while rendering humanitarian services .If they were passing on the road ,they were accompanied by security escorts to avoid being kidnapped but here the news of kidnapping of doctors is now like the violent strikes by Boko Haram and other militants .It is no longer news to Nigerians. The unlucky doctors die in the custody of the kidnappers while our security agents are still 'on top of the situation'. Kidnappers will leave politicians who have rendered them useless and face the same doctors who an average Nigerian believes is rendering humanitarian services,and who try to eke out a living so they can treat all citizens in differvent social classes. What an injustice to my colleagues ? Many doctors performing creditably well on American soil are mostly Nigerians but let them come back here, you will never hear about them again and Nigerians don't bother to ask why. Nigerians want us to use bare hands to catch poisonous snakes.
Nobody sits down to compare the percentage of our annual budget that goes to the health sector in a fiscal year, and correlate it with those of USA ,UK etc. It's unfair to address unequals as equals. Go to our tertiary hospitals, how many of the world class diagnostic machines are there? Even the primitive ones found there, how many of them are functional? But we all want Nigerian doctors to perform wonders, we have big companies in states where tertiary hospitals are located, how many of the companies assist the hospitals as part of their corporate social functions?
Imagine power outage in tertiary hospitals in the Niger delta for no other reason than no money to buy diesel for the generators but we have multinational companies in the Niger delta making their dollars from our own oil and sending the money to their countries while our people are dying of treatable and curable diseases. How many times do doctors defray the hospital bills of the patients they managed, buy their drugs and still feed them among other logistics ? Who bothers to bring that to the knowledge of the Nigerian public?
But let the doctors go on strike due to government refusal to implement agreements earlier reached with doctors, we would be demonized by the members of the press as professionals that are insensitive to the plights of their patients, wicked, inhuman, over-demanding, greedy etc. I ask ,where were the press and members of the Nigerian public when government blatantly refused to honour agreements reached with doctors ?Where were they when my colleagues were being kidnapped at their work places ? Where are they now,as my colleagues in many states are being owed at least four months salaries ? It is unfair to compare two things that are not supposed to be compared in the first place.
Our colleagues in the private sector treat patients and save lives but the relatives will refuse to pay, they may even find a way to attack the hospital staff and 'free' their relatives. To them, the doctor is a humanitarian worker hence the medical consumables used in saving their relative's lives were supplied free of charge to the hospital by other humanitarian agencies.
The building such hospital is sited is also owned by humanitarian agencies and by extension all the workers in the hospital are paid by international humanitarian agencies. An average Nigerian complains that doctors are more interested in the initial deposit before saving lives but nobody will equally complain about patients and their relatives who are ready to beat up the doctors and their workers after saving the lives of their relatives and well-wishers in order to leave our hospitals without paying a dime. If Nigerians have woken up to realise that they need free medical treatments, they should hold their leaders and politicians at ransom, not the doctors.
Surprisingly, in the health sector, our supposed neighbours who are supposed to join forces with us to fight for the welfare of all members of the health sector ,are busy being used by those in power to further polarise the health sector. When NLC had two factions after their last national election, little did we know that it was for the government’s advantage, until recently when Ayubba Wabba led faction went on strike,the Ajaero led faction refused to embark on any strike during the 2016 fuel subsidy crisis, the summary is that the strike was a failure unlike what we had in early 2012 when NLC was united. Today we have two major groups in the health sector, the doctors under the umbrella of NMA and other workers in the hospital under the umbrella of JOHESU. By extrapolation,I am aware that the emergence of JOHESU most likely may be a creation of the government.
Today, professionals are no longer talking about how to improve the working conditions of their members; everybody wants to head the health sector with or without the requisite qualifications, while our politicians smile to the banks daily. United, they say, we stand but divided we fall. Today, the health sector is in a shambles and nobody talks about Hazard allowance rather we are pawns in the hands of the politicians, a politician with an SSCE certificate can talk to or treat a professional the way he likes because we are not united. When America felt threatened by the size of USSR, they used members of USSR to collapse USSR, the same way it was Libyans that captured and killed Gaddafi but we are all aware of the international collaborations.Politicians everywhere apply the Napoleon's principles of putting their iron hands in a velvet glove.
The Nigerian press are not even helping matters, when doctors record a feat in medical practice or when a doctor is kidnapped, the media houses give it a marginal press coverage but when there is an alleged case of malpractice by a Nigerian medical doctor or when doctors embark on a strike, there will be a wide media coverage. Just recently, there was a story of an alleged Nigerian medical doctor who was involved in car snatching. The members of the press never bothered to confirm from either the Nigerian Medical Association or the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria, if the name of the suspect was on their register(s). They went ahead to, not only publish it, but also ensured that it occupied a conspicuous place among other major news headlines. This action of our journalists against medical practice in Nigerian is to say the least most unfortunate. They want to sell their papers by carrying anti-medical doctors' news but at the same time they end up painting not only the doctors bad but also Nigeria in general.
Rich men are ready to pay millions in foreign hospitals but if it is in Nigerian, you will see their power of bargaining. Mr president was said to have an ear infection and he travelled abroad and nobody could boldly ask him the reason for such unnecessary trip with taxpayers' money .Is it that we don't have Ear,Nose and Throat (ENT) surgeons in Nigeria or that we,as usual, do not have the medical equipment required in the management of such ailment? I put it to my readers that there are significant number of our citizens who suffer similar ailment as Mr president , but cannot afford medical treatment abroad.
Security agents are not even helping matters .The security agents mounting roadblocks will see a doctor rushing down to a hospital for a medical emergency and they will want the doctor to either 'roger' or come down to present all the papers for checking without minding the traffic congestion awaiting the said doctor in our busy roads. Also,the members of our Federal Road Safety Corps will use the opportunity to check your tyres, the quality of your car engine etc and when they are done with you, the patient you are rushing down to save his life will then be on the way to the mortuary .How many doctors, as humanitarian workers, are allowed not to queue up in our banks, filling stations etc so that they can be attended to first for them to go and continue their humanitarian services?
We are only humanitarian workers when we render services to the society but when the society renders services to us, all citizens will be equal before the law. That is the true story of the Nigerian doctor. How many philanthropists assist our hospitals or doctors to render the humanitarian services? But we all want Nigerian doctors to perform maximally and optimally.
I don't even want to talk about the roles of our religious leaders who claim that they can miraculously cure all ailments but end up creating more problems to the doctors ,as ailments that could be tackled efficiently at the incipient stages are allowed to degenerate in these religious houses where they are waiting for miracles and when such patients finally arrive the hospital ,at advanced stages of such ailments ,medical sciences will have little or no solution to such patients.
Dr Paul John
Port Harcourt, Rivers state
08083658038, [email protected]