The Nigeria Medical Association has promised to retreat from resorting to incessant strike actions as a bargaining tool to press home its demands considering the grave implication of such actions on the health sector .
Chairman of the Abia State chapter of NMA, Dr. Uwa Onwuchekwa, made the promise in Umuahia during the opening ceremony of the 2014 Physicians’ Week .
He pledged the preparedness of doctors to abide by the ethics of their profession which places saving lives above other considerations.
This, he said would also help to promote peace and tranquility in the health sector and re-assure public confidence in Nigerian doctors.
His words: “We must abide by our calling and training to give peace a chance in the health care system.
‘’Enough of unnecessary struggle and strikes; let us work together for the benefit of our people,’’ he said.
The NMA boss, however, appealed to the state government to help in creating the needed space for graduating medical doctors to do their mandatory house job.
He lamented that most of the qualified doctors in the state spend up to two years at home looking for space to do house job due to limited available space to accommodate the new graduates.
On the recent certification of Nigeria as Ebola- free country by the World Health Organisation, the NMA boss cautioned against re- entry of the virus into the country, and called for vigilance among residents.
‘’We need to remind our people that greater attention to hand washing and environmental cleanliness underlines good health and must continue even after EVD,’’ he said.
He however acknowledged the unity and synergy with which Nigeria confronted the outbreak of the disease, saying that the success recorded in the containment of the virus in Nigeria is an indication that Nigeria will achieve a lot as a united entity.
Dr. Onwuchekwa who gave the theme of this year’s annual event as ” Fight against Ebola Virus Disease”, said it was not yet Uhuru for Nigeria over the virus as it is still ravaging some counties in the West African sub- region.
Declaring the event open, Gov. Theodore Orji represented by the Secretary to the State Government, Professor Mkpa Agu Mkpa, charged doctors to always abide by the oath of their calling , and place less emphasis on money.
‘’Your job is a calling,” he said, adding that ” medical profession is an ultimatum God has given you; a course of action to assist Him in the act of creation.”
According to the Governor, ” this automatically imposes an obvious challenge on you so you shall at all time be above board.”
Orji also warned doctors against the unpatriotic attitude of some of them who give less attention to patients at public hospitals only to refer such patients to their private clinics where they collect higher service charges.
Earlier in his speech, Commissioner for Health, Dr. Okey Ogah, identified some of the landmark projects executed by Orji’s administration in the health sector to include : the construction of 250 primary health care centres, bringing the number to 710 in the 291 political wards in the state; the construction of Abia Specialist and Diagnostic Centre and a Dialysis Centre; the construction of eye centre ; 100-bed hospitals in six select councils in the state, among others.
Source:punch
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