To provide Nigerians with high-quality healthcare, the Federal Government must restructure and reposition the country’s healthcare system.
As a result, it has decided to proceed with its plans to digitize the country’s healthcare system and will launch a National Electronic Medical Record platform to ensure that the data it uses to provide care to the public is genuine and trustworthy.
Prof. Mohammed Ali Pate, the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, said in a statement to journalists yesterday in Abuja that the government plans to mobilize private capital to invest in physical infrastructure, equipment, and human resources in order to restore public confidence in the healthcare system and deter Nigerians from seeking treatment abroad for conditions that can be treated domestically.
“We need to make sure that our hospitals run more effectively so that our people will have faith in our healthcare system,” he said. To encourage those who have left the country to start returning, we must address the issue of the shrinking health workforce. To reduce the effects of emigration, we will restructure our human resources for health, expand the local medical workforce, and keep talent that already exists.
According to Pate, if the government works to improve infrastructure and solve issues that affect health workers, it will go a long way toward ending the ongoing strike in the health sector and bringing back some of the health professionals who have fled the nation.
As part of efforts to address ongoing strikes in the health sector, the minister noted that he, the minister of state, and the permanent secretary in the ministry met with four professional associations. During this meeting, the associations acknowledged the need to put past disputes behind them and start the process of reestablishing trust and the respectability of the health profession.
Pate said that Nigeria had less doctors per 1,000 people than the World Health Organization’s standards despite the country having over 400,000 health personnel in all categories. Thus, there is a need for greater health worker training.
In order to deal with epidemics as soon as they occur, the Minister gave the assurance that the government would improve the country’s health security.
He said that in order to advance the health industry, state governments must play a crucial role.
“We must raise the standard of health governance so that we can track success, lessen political meddling, and promote participation. The foundation for bringing our nation back together and fostering cohesiveness can be health.
“We’ll put equity first and focus on serving people when providing services. All Nigerians, especially the most vulnerable communities, would have access to the internet.
“In order to make sure that individuals feel appreciated and valued, our own perspective will change to become more people-oriented. We will open value chains, enabling the manufacturing of medicines, medical equipment, and other goods in Nigeria for Nigerians, support goals for import substitution, and make sure that these goods and services have reliable markets and can reach our people.
“We will ensure that Nigeria is ready to respond to epidemics, pandemics, and humanitarian disasters,” the statement reads.
Tunji Alausa, the minister of state for health, earlier stated that the nation’s research facilities needed to be modernized and that the government would establish a national research fund.
He stated that if prompt action was not taken, the nation will be greatly burdened by the increased incidence of communicable diseases.
Alausa promised that the healthcare system will be properly regulated so that medical facilities could be held accountable.
