Our Allergic President

PRESIDENT Umaru Musa Yar’Adua went to Germany for a medical review, his spokesman said. Additional details have it that it was a case of allergic reaction, in which case a review could mean an unsuccessful treatment of the ailment in Nigeria.

What concerns us, however, is foreign medical treatment for our public office holders. It is an area the examples are appalling, just as medical facilities in Nigeria have fallen into decay, notwithstanding all the noise about the renovation of the teaching hospitals two years ago.

A few weeks to the elections last year, there was an international scare over the Yar’Adua’s health. He was his party’s presidential candidate. Again, Germany was where he was rushed to treat severe nasal congestion, which hampered his breathing. Yar’Adua blamed the tedious campaign trips across the country for his illness then.

We wish the President quick recovery. Nigerians need him around to attend to the monumental neglect the country has suffered over the years. One of the minor indicators of that neglect is that he has to be flown abroad to mend the slightest ache.

For a private citizen, who would have been depending on private funds for his health bills, Nigerians would not have bothered. The issue is really more profound than the money spent on our President’s health.

It is more about leading by example, one area the President promised he would be different. Is the President not alarmed that there are no hospitals in Nigeria that can treat him? This concern is being raised because we have been assured that this presidency would be different. His trip abroad to obtain medical services repeats the same verdict of poor services that has been passed on the Nigerian health system for years by those who run it.

We should remember we are talking about a President who calls him a servant-leader! Is it then appropriate for our servant and our leader to seek medical intervention abroad, when millions of Nigerians, who he serves, die from common illnesses like typhoid, malaria, dysentery, guinea worms, and other diseases that are mostly water-borne. How many more die from breathing difficulties, in view of pollution in the country?

They are not asking to be taken abroad. Many of them would be happy to get medical attention from the old dispensaries that now stand as relics of a forgotten past. They have no options, and it hurts that nobody cares about them.

Suggestions have always been made for our leaders to give up their privilege of going for treatment abroad. It is an obscene privilege that hurts the poor, and makes it even more difficult for public health faculties to get attention, since those who can effect changes do not taste the paucity of services in Nigerian hospitals.

The President should set the example in this. If he makes medical services of his taste available, more Nigerians would use. Nigeria too can earn foreign exchange from our neighbours who would patronise the facilities.