Lagos – Prof. Folasade Ogunsola, the Provost, College of Medicine, University of Lagos, on Monday decried the situation where by 25 medical doctors attend to 100,000 persons.
“A country that boasts of 25 doctors per every 100,000 population (using 39,210 doctors for 158 million people) is far below the standard and had made doctors out of us all,’’ she said.
Ogunsola, a medical microbiologist, spoke in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos.
She called for the training of more medical students that would be proportional with the nation’s emerging population.
The don also bemoaned the frightening increase of infectious diseases globally with Africa accounting for a larger percentage.
The don commenting on the rate of infectious diseases in Africa said, “Infectious diseases have for centuries ranked with wars and famine as major challenges to human progress and survival.
“But, we have a major challenge in Africa due to backwardness.
“Infectious disease is among the leading causes of death and disability worldwide. It is more ravaging in the third world to which Africa belongs to.
“We have cases of established infections, epidemics of new and old infectious diseases periodically emerging, greatly magnifying the global burden of infections, the case we have in Africa is overwhelming.
“Studies from Africa about these emerging infections revealed the evolutionary properties of pathogenic micro-organisms and the dynamic relationships between micro-organisms, their hosts and the environment,’’ she said.
Ogunsola said that most of the emerging infectious diseases defiled treatment and were not easily managed because many of them were not preventable through vaccination.
“By mid-19th century, the discovery of microbes as causative agents of infectious diseases led to the development of preventive counter-measures such as passive immunotherapy, vaccines and drugs against infective agents.
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“This has not worked out because they keep on revolving to the extent that physicians and public health workers began to lose sight of the emergence of new and previously unrecognised infectious diseases.
“ It is appropriate to ask what has been learnt about this. Where have we succeeded or failed in our efforts to fight them, and what challenges are remaining?,’’ she said.
Ogunsola, on how to tackle the infectious diseases, said that the continent had many issues ranging from lifestyle to political reasons.
“In Africa, we need to first look at the problems of high superstitious beliefs, and stigma associated with lack of knowledge.
“Others caused by government are non-inclusion of traditional heads or healers in the nation’s health programme, inadequate infrastructure, breakdown of public health infrastructure, poverty and social inequality.
“War and famine, lack of political will, inadequate research and poor remuneration of health workers through inappropriate budgeting had greatly undermined the system,’’ she said.
Ogunsola said that to effectively tackle the burden of emerging infectious diseases, Africa needs to re-assess its strategies through budgeting and focus more on the rural areas where those diseases originated from.
According to her, African communities are growing rapidly and it is predicted that by 2050, the population of Africa will hit two billion, with 60 per cent living in the cities, mostly in slums.
“We can see the trend already in Lagos, if the rural urban migration continues unabated, Lagos will double its population by 2024.
“I have counted at least 20 large slums in Lagos and there are other many smaller slum communities.
“We must find a sustainable solution to the problem of slums where these infectious diseases are emanating from.
“Government needs to address slums with long term solutions, the convergence and interactions of people, animals and our environment had created a new dynamic in which the health of the inhabitant is central.
“The challenges associated with this dynamic are demanding, profound, and unprecedented. At the same time, new opportunities have emerged to protect and promote health in the rapidly changing human, animal and environment domains.’’
She said it was curious that the health sector in Africa was riddled with the prevalence of fake and substandard drugs and inadequate medical equipment and dearth of quality personnel.
“Government needs to, in clear and simple terms, show dedication to quality healthcare, because low budgetary allocation to the health sector will affect the growth of the sector.(NAN)
