Lagos to reduce foreign medical treatment-Fashola

Posted by admin Headlines, Lagos, State News Saturday, July 2nd, 2011

Lagos State governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN), on Friday reiterated the commitment of his administration to reducing, to its barest minimum, the number of medical cases taken abroad from the state for treatment, saying the capital flight resulting from such foreign treatments was not good for the state.

Fashola, who spoke at the Lagos House, Alausa, when he met the Medical Mission from Ruby Hall, India, who are in Lagos to assist the local medical team to perform cardiac surgery in the State’s University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), said his administration was also interested in developing a competitive exchange with India.

He told the six-man Mission, led by Dr. Sameer Ghotavadekar,”Our objective is to reduce the amount of money we spend exporting patients to India for treatment. It is not good for our business. I want to keep that business in Lagos, I want to keep it for our doctors, I want to keep it for our nurses”.

According to the governor, “One of the responsibilities of government is the obligation to prolong life, to make it worth living and we can only do this if we keep our people healthy; a healthy workforce, a healthy population is a very useful asset to any nation”.

“But as we deal the clinical end of cardiac issues, I think that we must remind ourselves that our work lies with the prevention areas of cardiac problems; continuing advocacy to our people about lifestyle choices, about what they eat, what they drink, where they work, what they are exposed to”, the Governor said adding that the aforementioned are “the quick wins that I think that, as a government, as a people, we should continue to emphasize”.

He said government started an advocacy programme for free screening for diabetes and hypertension “because a combination of those have been the two big risk factors for cardiac problems”, urging the leaders of the state’s health sector to continue that advocacy and treatment.

Expressing joy that the government is now developing local capacity for the treatment of cardiac problems, Fashola declared, “Many of the situations that you ultimately get to see, apart from the congenital issues, are sometimes preventable if they are detected early enough”.

Thanking the Mission “for the exchange of partnership” that has brought them to the state, Fashola, who said the frontiers of Medicine lie so far ahead, asserted, “I believe that as we improve and challenge you, you will remain also continuously on your toes because, don’t under-estimate us all, we learn quickly”.

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