Pharmacists Call for Drastic Action to Save Nigeria’s Health Sector

The Association of Community Pharmacists of Nigeria (ACPN) has called for a concerted effort by stakeholders to save the country’s health sector from an imminent collapse.

In a document jointly signed by ACPM National Chairman and Secretary, Dr. Samuel Adekola and Mr. Ambrose Ezeh, respectively, the body lamented the intractable challenges in the country’s health sector due to ‘’shoddy and irresponsible administrative patterns in the health system.

‘’ACPN have continued to critically evaluate the Nigerian health space and we are driven by a strong conviction that greed and avarice have encouraged an inequitable spread of privileges and resources of players in the health system to the detriment of consumers of health who are short-changed by the government and providers.’’

“The ACPN puts on record that all the goals and objectives of both the National Health Policy and National Drug Policy, which centres on accessibility, affordability, safe and efficacious health care services and credible drugs supply system have never been and may never be met because of the shoddy and irresponsible manner we have adopted in running our health system.”

It criticised appointments in the health sector, saying it was against international best practices that hinges on the philosophy of meritocracy, which allowed for selection based on merit and competencies.

The document further said: “It is unfortunate that Nigerian physicians and their umbrella body have blackmailed and as well as intimidated successive administrations in Nigeria at the federal and many states levels to continue to insist that appointments as Minister of Health and Commissioners for Health as well as those of Permanent Secretaries remain the birthright of physicians without any trace of backing in the relevant statute books.

“The scenario is the same with all appointments into the MDAs at the federal and state levels with deleterious consequences on public health outputs in Nigeria. It should interest observers that all appointments into prime MDAs in the health sector for instance; NHIS, NPHCDA, NACA, NCDC, Essential Drug List Committee and all special health intervention programmes including National Malaria Control, Tuberculosis Control, Leprosy Control e.t.c. are dominated by physicians, including heads of all public hospitals at both state and federal level. In other climes, positions of leadership are based purely on merit, skill and competencies. A quick example is the current Director General of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, an Eritrean-born Ethiopian biologist and public health researcher.

“Our observation confirms that the biggest contribution of physicians to our health system remain the negative health indices which is the trademark of our declining and almost disgraceful health system.’’

Continuing, the pharmacists said ‘’the desperation to sustain the unhealthy status-quo in the health sector has gotten to a climax of the absurd. A case in hand is the connivance of the Federal Ministry of Health not to allow the rule of law prevail despite several court rulings affirming the autonomy of Medical Laboratory Science and the jurisdictional competence of Medical Laboratory Scientist to prevail in clinical laboratories. Desperate Physicians and Pathologists will not let this see the light of day.

‘’At a recent public hearing at the Senate, the NMA and other groups of Physicians tried to impose provisions into the MDCN Amendment Bill, 2020 by trying to cede powers to head clinical diagnostic laboratories to Pathologists and Radiologists against known tenets of good health practice. More provocative were attempts by physicians to annexe the statutory and professional responsibilities of pharmacists to dispense medicines legitimately in the health system.

It is most shameful that in 2021, the leadership of physicians attempted to use a colleague who heads a prominent Senate Committee to actually impose alien standards in one of our laws to serve the parochial and pecuniary interests of a few egoistic physicians.

‘’These illogicality has continued only because physicians enjoy the clandestine support of their members in high places to continue to disrupt progressive inclinations in the health sector. This is the incentive and motivation to insist that all public appointments in the health sector must be at the behest of physicians and NMA. This madness must stop’’.

‘’We therefore call on all the progressive minded professional bodies to join forces with Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU), Civil Rights Societies and other patriots to form a workable coalition force which must immediately take actions to save the situation.