Health is wealth and rightly so because it is only a person who is healthy that can think of his multiple businesses. A sick person's focus is on getting better and would not be on amassing riches whike on sick bed.
So far, all over the world, medical practitioners are doing their best to keep people healthy. They stay on call for more than 48 hours a shift, working to keep patients disease free. Most of these doctors barely have a social life as you would always find them eithe reading one big book of medical jargon or with their nose in one research project.
I call medical practitioners heroes in their own right because of what they do and how their presence helps maintain sanity. When you visit a hospital and see the immense pressure that rests on the shoulders of doctors and nurses, you will surely appreciate their efforts.
*”But what is the incentive that goes to them for all that they do?’”
This is the questions to discuss and I want to treat it with seriousness. To be honest, the health sector in Nigeria is suffering and facing huge challenges and the government is not even bothered about it. Only the private health sector is actually thriving but that is only possible because the people pay costly fees for treatment.
The government hospitals which have subsidized fees are a mess and some of the staff transfer aggression easily without fail. Many times, I dread visiting government hospitals as I don't want embarrassment from nurses and some other medical staff.
Visiting private hospitals might be expensive but at least, you are guaranteed care because the staff are aware that the customer is king. I believe that if the government can pay more attention to the public health sector by providing modern equipment and increasing the pay of medical practitioners, government hospitals would be the best across board.
Don't get me wrong, government hospitals have qualified personnels who know their onions but with poorly managed facilities. Some of thede hospitals don't have enough beds for patients, little wards and no modern health care facilities. Strike action has been taken severally, but it is the patients who suffer the most from it.
I recall when my mom was diagnosed with acute kidney failure about twelve years ago at the Lagos State Teaching Hospital (LUTH). She began treatment and all the necessary surgeries were done on her to begin dialysis but just after her first dialysis treatment, the medical practitioners went on strike.
When we visited the hospital for her second round of dialysis, we were shocked to find the hospital deserted like a barren land. Panicking, we began asking for alternatives and that was when a nurse gave us a card to a dialysis center in Surulere. When we got there, we discovered that the center was a private clinic owned by one of the doctors working at LUTH. To summarize, my mom continued her dialysis treatment at that clinic but the cost was triple the amount charged by LUTH.
With no choice, we paid for the treatment, until finally death came knocking and she kicked the bucket. The strike by the medical practitioners in the government hospitals lasted for about six weeks but within that period of time, many patients died due to lack of medical attention. It could have been avoided if the government could allocate more financial resources to the public health sector but I guess they're too busy and the people are the ones fending for themselves.
Thank you all for reading. This is my entry to the #hivelearners initiative for w172e3.
Images source: Meta Ai
