Billions of dollars that should help the ailing Nigerian economy is being pumped into the economy of other countries by mere 30,000 people, an infinitesimal part of the nation’s huge population, BDSUNDAY investigation has shown.
The estimated $1billion spent on medical tourism by Nigerians can provide six world class hospitals with at least 238 beds in each of Nigeria’s geo-political zones at $167 million.
In 2015, a 210-bed specialist hospital in the United Kingdom, funded by the NHS, was built in Cramlington at the cost of $134 million.
In India, lower costs are achieved and most certainly, better outcomes are achievable in Nigeria.
Each of these hospitals if established in Nigeria will be able to provide specialty wards for Surgery, Trauma, Cardiology, Respiratory, Elderly care (including stroke), Gastrointestinal, and Operating
theatres for emergency/high risk surgery.
Each of these hospitals if established in Nigeria will be able to provide specialty wards for Surgery, Trauma, Cardiology, Respiratory, Elderly care (including stroke), Gastrointestinal, and Operating
theatres for emergency/high risk surgery.
Nigeria has been described as one of the biggest sufferers of medical tourism in the world. Factors like inadequate medical equipment, personnel, and also inadequate infrastructure have greatly
contributed to the abysmal state of Nigeria’s healthcare sector.
contributed to the abysmal state of Nigeria’s healthcare sector.
Inadequate health facilities have culminated into lack of faith in the health sector, a condition which constantly leads to the increase of top public officers and other wealthy Nigerians with life-threatening ailments travelling abroad in search of better medical care.
The Nigerian Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) in collaboration with the International Finance Corporation (IFC) recently disclosed that they would be making considerable investments worth billions of dollars in order to curtail the challenges that have reduced the Nigerian health sector to its dilapidated state.
“Currently, we have $400million in our reserves and we have earmarked $140 million to healthcare infrastructure and this is especially crucial given the research we recently conducted which revealed that over $1billion is incurred by roughly 30,000 Nigerians annually on health care services outside the country,” said Stella Ojekwe-Onyejeli, chief risk officer and executive director, NSIA.
“Cardiovascular, Orthopaedics, Renal and Cancer treatments make up to 80percent of the reasons for the trips by Nigerians outside the country on health issues,” Onyejeli added.
Experts say that the collaboration represents potentials for private-driven entities that seem poised to seize the entrepreneurial opportunities which abound in the health sector.
The experts also believe that by attempting to seize this opportunity and redirecting the cash flow into the comatose local health sector, capital flight will be avoided, more Nigerians will be employed through this value chain, and the country may be on the path to becoming a destination for medical tourism itself.
The Saudi-German Hospital had in 2015 announced plans to invest about 300 million dollars to establish hospitals in Lagos, Abuja and Kano.
Samir Shaker, chief operating officer of Saudi- German hospitals, had said that “Nigeria deserves such an investment after a survey which showed that Nigeria’s healthcare system was poor leading to an influx of Nigerian patients to Saudi Arabia for treatment.”
The private sector, the biggest provider of health care services in Nigeria, struggles to stay afloat in a pool of challenges which has deterred the sector in delivering affordable, accessible and quality
health care for Nigerians.
health care for Nigerians.
At present, leading private hospitals in Nigeria include Reddington, Lagoon, St Nicholas, and Abuja Clinics. There is also Mecure Diagnostic Centres, a leading diagnostic services provider in Nigeria with millions of dollars in funding from its India-based promoters; similarly, Vedic Hospitals which was established in Nigeria in 2013 with support from India’s Manipal Health Enterprises.
“We see the challenges across the [health] sector, everybody complains about access to capital…but there are broader issues that if these group of individuals came together, perhaps, collectively we can help solve,” says Eme Essien Lore, IFC county manager for Nigeria.
It has been alleged severally that seeds of such laudable investments in critical sectors in Nigeria often never sprout as corruption seems to soil it. Reacting to this, Lore stated that the investments in Nigeria’s health sector would be monitored with dart-like precision to ensure efficiency especially since it has a private investment stake.
The possibilities for medical tourism still remain largely untapped as the billions spent abroad can be mopped up to improve the value chain for health care delivery in Nigeria.
LOLADE AKINMURELE & CALEB OJEWALE
Join BusinessDay whatsapp Channel, to stay up to date
Open In Whatsapp
