Reps Hint On Plans To Declare State Of Emergency On Health Sector

The Chairman, House Committee on Health, Amos Magaji in the House of Representatives has said there are moves in the pipelines for declaration of emergency in the country’s health sector with a view to repositioning it to meet the health needs of the citizens.

Magaji, spoke at the Federal Teaching Hospital Ido Ekiti  (FETHI), Ekiti state when members of the committee, who were on Southwest Oversight Function visited the tertiary institution.

According to him,  many challenges facing the country’s health sector would soon be a thing of the past, adding that the allocation was not enough to  serve the hospitals and patients in the country in view of Nigeria’ s increasing population.

Magaji, who explained that addressing the problems in the nation’s health sector required a multi-pronged approach, assured that the sector would soon bounce back when the needful was done.

In his remarks, the Chief Medical Director of FETHI,  Prof. Adekunle Ajayi, who took the committee members round the facility, listed the challenges of the health institution to include huge power cost, inadequate water supply, poor access roads, ecological challenges, uncertain manpower planning and need to upgrade medical facility.

The new Histopathology Building; New Accident and Emergency Ward, Assisted Reproductive Technology, 150-bedded building, Molecular Laboratory and Physiotherapy Building were some of the facilities inspected by the House Committee members

Magaji after inspecting  the facilities praised FETHI management for utilizing the available space and the huge expansion, saying, “We are impressed with what they have done with the resources that the federal government has given them”.

He said, “The National Assembly, going forward, will be pushing for a state of emergency to be declared on Health because where we are now as a nation, it is not possible that health will be funded by the budget.

“We have gone round many health institutions and the problems are basically the same, lack of equipment, the manpower is a problem, equipment is a problem, the infrastructure in health institutions is also massively inadequate and of course very critical, the issue of power is killing the health institutions,” he said.