Dogara Decries Foreign Medical Trips, Wants Health Sector Overhauled

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has decried the high rate of foreign medical trips by Nigerians, calling for a total overhaul of the health sector to allow efficiency.

Speaking at a public hearing organised by the House Committee on Health on two bills at the National Assembly in Abuja on Wednesday, Dogara stated that the attendant brain drain in the health sector was becoming worrisome while calling for a quick intervention to guarantee efficient and effective delivery.

The two bills under consideration were a Bill for an Act to Repeal the Health Records Officers  (Registration, etc) Act, CAP. H2 of the Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004 and Re-Enact the Health Information Practitioners Council of Nigeria for effective  and efficient Health Information Management, to Regulate  the Training, Practice and Management of Health  Information System in Nigeria; and a Bill for an Act to Amend the Institute of Chartered Chemists of Nigeria Act, CAP 1.112, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, to Provide for the Role of the Chemist, the Regulation of Practicing Fees by Members of the Institute; and for Other Related Matters.

Dogara said, “The ultimate aim of these legislations is to ensure that we have a more efficient service delivery in the health sector.  There is a compelling need for us to overhaul our health sector in view of the continuous public outcry against our defective health care delivery.

“The high number of Nigerians who go on foreign medical trips and the brain drain that we witness among our professionals in the sector, are indications that our health sector requires a serious surgical operation.”