HEALTH: A HUGE SHAME! WILL OUR CHILDREN AND UNBORN GENERATIONS FORGIVE US?

It’s so shameful to say the least that our country is really grinding to a HALT given the way things are going. I bet you, it will take only a miracle to get us out of this mess we are in at the moment.

And hey wait! Before you start casting blames on Jonathan, Yar’adua, Obasanjo and other past administration, I would like you to take a deep breath or better still a huge chill pill because we are all to blame for this situation we have found ourselves.

Now tell me, is it the government that will tell the management in a hospital to bring out already bought equipments to treat patients or is it the government that will go and take inventory CORRECTLY, or fix faulty machines and even buy diesel for generating sets?

I could go on and on and we would still not get to the end even if we spent the whole day.

The truth is, we have all failed firstly, as citizens of this country, secondly, as a people created by God and thirdly, as terrible trailblazers for generations yet unborn.

I just read in the vanguard that thousands of cancer patients are currently facing death nationwide, following a breakdown of all the radiotherapy machines at treatment centres in the country; a development which is no longer news to us as it has become a recurrent issue in our country for years. Sadly it has passed  manageable in the last few weeks as  thousands of patients and their relatives have raised fears and concerns having been turned back from some of the cancer centres as the machines are said to have developed problems due to lack of maintenance and overuse, as a result machines at the National Hospital Abuja, NHA, Lagos University Teaching Hospitals, LUTH, University College Hospital, UCH, Ibadan, including others in health institutions in Gombe, Enugu, Benin, Sokoto among others are allegedly having the same stories.

That is quite scary because it is a sure death penalty dangling over the heads of these patients if all the machines at the different centres are all truly faulty as reported. So what would the patients do? Especially those who do not have the wherewithal to go abroad.

Now the question any one would ask is “why do we always wait for everything to get bad at the same time before we start running about”? We have always run a bad maintenance culture in everything we use. It has become a part of us. When it comes to maintenance, 1-10 rating is zero as instead of running before-breadown, RBB, we run till-breakdown, RTB.

Reports had it that  the affected hospitals and their managements have adduced the lack of money to buy forex in order to bring in foreign experts to fix the machines hence all those who have oncology problems today in the country, may have to wait for a long time for their treatment to continue.

On the other hand and more heartbreaking according to an oncology expert is that, it was better for an oncology patient not to get radiation treatment than to get half dose or incomplete dosage. He was quoted to have said: “If somebody is getting a radiation treatment and breaks, the cells will now build immunity and bounce back.”

Another worrisome development in the report is that at the NHA, the new Lineal Accelerator Machine procured in 2014 is still intact in the crate and there are fears that they may have gone bad under the condition they are kept. So what are we talking about here?

They say patients need machines for treatment and they are talking about machines which ought to be used for treatment still in crates. Since 2014!

Do we need the government to help management think outside the box? They are busy turning back patients fro hospitals and screaming ‘foreign exchange’, light upsurge, machines are old, and more yet a machine is laying unused or getting bad as mentioned, in some crates. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that it’s not only in NHA that “new machines are still in crates”. This is what I call heartless. May God really help us in this country.

I take some bit of solace in the words of Professor Francis Abayomi Durosimi Etti the Chairman, National Programme on Cancer Management, who confirmed the situation and also added authoritatively that government is doing a lot to get things done as regards the health facility.

Hmmm! We heard all of that and even more in the past. All we are saying is, enough of the ‘talk’, is time to ‘walk the talk’ and this walk will only make sense if we all do our parts in our different circles and up to the government.

You, who is a nurse, doctor, cleaner and worker in the –private and public- hospitals, do you play your part well to enable things move smoothly and keep facilities in working conditions?

Doctors, HOD, Dean, matron et al. what are you doing right or wrong?

Our leaders in Government, including the President, Vice President, Senate, Ministers, et al. What are you doing right or wrong?

And for the rest of us in our little corners. What are you doing right or wrong?

I guess the ball is in all OUR HANDS!

We all need to improve on our maintenance culture when it comes to public and private facilities, eschew foul plays, bitterness,thereby making things work in our country and even our children as well as the unborn generation will bless our souls.

MAY NOT BE PERFECT, BUT THE GRASS WOULD ALL BE GREEN

A friend, Blessing-Obi on his facebook page posted:

"When l look back to my birth country, l see people struggling, women sad, men kicked out of jobs, sisters travelling to Abuja and Lagos to start a career in prostitution popularly known as "runs", running inflation besets the economy, innocent children roam the streets, people blaming Govt. Insecurity everywhere even with the kidnappings of commoners and monarchs. And in the midst of these social ills and despair l still see HOPE, HOPE and BELIEF. Let corrupt politicians who live in luxurious houses and drive expensive cars wallow in stolen wealth, the sweat of the Nigerian, still l see HOPE, l still BELIEVE in HOPE. A day is come and it is no longer far, we sit with fellas, we are planning, the days are near, when political criminals will gnash their teeth and common Nigerians smile, children would have clothes on their backs, although not a perfect world where the grass is all green, but at least a world fair enough".

After reading the post above, you would agree with all sense of being unbiased that this is ‘hard truth’ and a clear picture of what is really going on in Nigeria at the moment and to say the least, it scares me.

Yes, it should scare you because the way things are at the moment tells that except God intervenes, it may get worse and if it does, the rhetorical question is, “who will be spared” or “which class or category of persons in the country will not feel the brunt”?

The kidnappers are no longer after just the high, rich and wealthy but are also after people who can barely pay their rents. So also robbers are not just after the rich neither are the ‘runs’ girls after just the rich as they go round every Emeka, Shola, Dahiru, Akpan, Tom, Dick and Harry to hustle even if it means getting a token or recharge cards from a couple of these Toms, Dicks and Harrys, at the end of the day, to them, every ‘collection’ add up for something.

Children hang around people even strangers to see if they can get freebies because many of them hardly get to eat enough at home anymore.

Well dressed and healthy looking people now stop you on a daily basis begging for food. The list and scenarios are endless.

  

One TV soap that was widely watched and followed by many back in the 90s ‘the rich also cry’ comes to mind even as reality of the economic situation sets in on a daily basis.

Ironically, many of the ‘rich’ who are now also crying, are making the poor who have cried nearly every day of their lives, cry even more than always because many of these supposedly ‘rich’ are unrepentantly owing a larger number of these ‘poor’ without any hope of paying up even in the nearest future.

These ‘owed’ poor are faced with the dilemmas of dud cheques which have ‘bounced’ severally or tales of “sorry my mummy, daddy, uncle, aunty or even friend (as the case may be) is not home” even when the person is quietly hidden in the house and children or wards are made to tell lies.

It should scare you even more because as at this morning the Governor of the Nigerian Central bank was reported to have told Senators during a closed door meeting that the country is in what he termed ‘stagflation’, trapped between a ‘stagnant’ economy and a high level of ‘inflation’ even as the IMF has also officially asserted that the country is going through an economic recession.

What scares me the most is the hanging ‘if’ which the CBN Governor was said to have left in the air. That is, the part where government may not be able to pay salaries by October this year, 2016 if things remain or get worse than this. This should really scare you.

The question now is “what is the way forward”.

Like my friend Obi reeled out in the post as seen at the beginning of this write up. So many people have been sacked, women sad, children roaming the streets, ‘runs’ increasing as more ladies are joining the trade traveling not only between Abuja and Lagos with the social media making it a lot more easier. Sad but true and even more.

Ironically, men are not giving without ‘taking’ as everything given must be paid for in ‘kind’ even for as little as lunch, a drink, recharge cards, phone and more; not to mention when you ask for a huge sum, rent, car the list goes on. Shameful! That tells you how tough it is out there.

Nevertheless, there is hope, hope in the fact that you can choose to either sit back, fold your hands, until you eventually die as a result of hunger or find something honourable to do while we await a way forward from the government. Learn a trade and avoid depravities, spend wisely as that’s the way to go for now because even the ‘mugu’ is getting wiser as we speak or as you read. *winks*

Enough of the ‘blame game’ about this Politician or that Politician did this or that. However know that there is hope but for now, “Let corrupt politicians who live in luxurious houses and drive expensive cars wallow in stolen wealth, the sweat of the Nigerian, still l see HOPE, l still BELIEVE in HOPE. A day is come and it is no longer far, we sit with fellas, we are planning, the days are near, when political criminals will gnash their teeth and common Nigerians smile, children would have clothes on their backs, although not a perfect world where the grass is all green, but at least a world fair enough”.

   

Hopefully, the question on ‘the way forward’ would be near ‘answered’.  

NIGERIANS ARE FANTASTICALLY...

Amid government’s efforts in fighting the so popularized ‘corruption’, Nigerians are no doubts getting angrier by the day as nothing seems to be moving despite the number of people being arraigned or probed or what have you on a daily basis. No one has being convicted so far just cases of indictment here and there while Nigerians are losing saliva talking about the ‘forever looking’ game of home invasion, indictment, probe and eventually ‘deafening silence’ of the many mentioned money laundering crime stories.
 

I know this may come out clichéd but then I still need to say this “I hate politics” in as much as interesting it is to the detriment of the masses, “I hate politics” but unfortunately I will need to keep talking about and discussing issues related to it because nearly everything that one writes about is one way or the other intertwined or interwoven around this very ‘fantastically corrupt’ word ‘politics’.

Fantastically corrupt? Yeah right. Fantastically corrupt, and are you surprised? Well in case you do not know by now, I wasn’t the one who started it; ask David Cameron the British Prime Minister. It was he who used the word whilst describing how corrupt Nigeria is during a corridor talk. Well, there are speculations going around that he never knew words of that discussion would come out in the open. Too bad Cameyyy, word got out! Next time you’d be more careful!! Always remember ‘walls have ears’!!!

Growing up and even now, when a child does something good or brilliant, the parent goes “that’s fantastic! Give yourself a round of applause” and the child goes clap clap clap clap clap and then the child ends with “myself” happily with a good feeling of a job well done or self-accomplishment.

When I read about Cameron’s statement on Nigeria and how fantastically corrupt she is as a nation, I was wondering why he used the word until this morning when I saw this picture as seen here (above left) depicting the true picture of the state of the children of the politicians and the children of the voters *the less corrupt Nigerians* who set these politicians on the ruling seats. It was after I took another look at the picture that I said “maybe just maybe, Cameron was right when he made that statement.

Yesterday while out with a couple of friends and this issue was being discussed, one of the guys with us said Cameron was “high on expensive but expired painkillers” when he made that statement and we all laughed at his sarcastic remark.

Now take a look at that picture above again. What are your thoughts?

My take is, whether or not Cameron was high on expired drugs or painkillers, one is tempted to agree with him to a large extent. If not that these politicians are so good or should I also say ‘fantastically good’ at what they do *not including the job of making the lives of Nigerians better though* why is it that after all these years the gap between the rich and the poor keeps widening year in, year out? Yet every election year, you still see children of the masses killing themselves over unrealistic promises of a ‘better life’ from Politicians ‘If elected as whatever’ while their children are far way overseas enjoying themselves as majority of them do not even bother to vote when they know that the very ‘gullible’ children of the ‘have nots’ will do the dirty jobs that will eventually get their folks into power. I just don’t get it.

So why are Nigerians reacting angrily to what Cameron said? Mtcheeew!

On my way home yesterday, someone who is on vacation in London called into a program of a radio station and said all those Newspapers that keep publishing stories of court arraignments are wasting their newsprint because: it is no longer interesting to millions of Nigerians who already know that nothing may come out of these arraignments,  hence they are better off publishing stories of how tomatoes can be got cheaper in the markets or how to locate stations where fuel can be bought at the regulated price of N86.05 per litre. I laughed but then, the guy spoke the minds of many Nigerians.

Many Nigerians are not moved by these stories of who is being probed anymore as such excitements have long being exhausted.

So Nigerians, let’s get off this Cameron ‘thing’ and heal ourselves of this mess we’ve found ourselves as a Nation. We have enough on our plate to deal with as it is, as a country. We are just 'fantastically' good at fighting the wrong battles!

While not supporting Cameron for that insult, I want us, especially our leaders to remember that 'a government is a reflection of the governed'.