Worried by the continued strike action of the Nigerian Medical Doctors (NMA), the Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu on Friday challenged the doctors to public debate to trash out the contentious issues.
The minister said he could not understand how NMA could sign Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with government and still refused to call off the strike. Prof. Onyebuchi who spoke to Journalist ion the NMA ongoing strike said, "they have signed the second MOU with us on the 3rd of July, last week Thursday. For two times now, they’ve said they would call off the strike; they have signed. I don’t know, when someone gives you a cheque, you are expected to go and cash your money.”
On whether government had fulfilled its part of the bargain, the minister said, “absolutely, 100 percent absolutely. That is why I said maybe we should have a high-powered debate before Nigerian public. Let each side state what their issues are, let’s take it one by one. I am assuring Nigerians that as their Minister of Health, on my honour, the federal government, led by President Goodluck Jonathan has done what it ought to do. That is why they signed an MOU. Why will you sign an MOU when you are not satisfied with the negotiation? These two negotiations took place over 24 hours; that is whole day without sleep.”
On what government is doing to ensure Ebola fever does not spread into the country, the minister said since there is no vaccine for the disease, everything depends on surveillance. He said, "In the case of Nigeria, we are carrying out surveillance through our Ports. Health Services at the point of entry. You know again because of the way Nigerian land borders are, sometimes you do have leakages where people just walk across through authorized border areas.
"We are trying to see working with other agencies because we can’t do it alone. We need to work with the Ministry of Agriculture which is currently monitoring the migrant populace. You know people migrate from one reason or the other; they are already monitoring some of them, especially those who are nomad pastoralists.
"We need to work with the Ministry of Interior in terms of checking our borders. What we do is that we watch out for people coming in from these areas, especially people who are travelling from Central Africa. When they come into Nigeria, we need to ensure that we monitor them, track to ensure that even when they have fever, we’ll now make sure what that fever is.
We have put those things in place. "Nigerians should be part of the efforts. It has been shown that in the case of Guinea, bats have played a key role. Bats are also in Nigeria like in many other countries. And, bats, when they harbour this virus, it doesn’t do any harm to bats. But, when people get involved into, maybe, fruits that were eaten by the bats, they inject this virus and it becomes harmful to human beings. It is a very fatal disease. It is like nine out of ten that are affected are likely to die.
So, it is worse than laser fever. Laser is terrible, not to talk of Ebola. "That is why we should commend President Goodluck Jonathan for in Council approving the White Paper that contains that the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control to now be allowed to be run as a parastatal, not just as a department in the Federal Ministry of Health.”
The minister said he could not understand how NMA could sign Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with government and still refused to call off the strike. Prof. Onyebuchi who spoke to Journalist ion the NMA ongoing strike said, "they have signed the second MOU with us on the 3rd of July, last week Thursday. For two times now, they’ve said they would call off the strike; they have signed. I don’t know, when someone gives you a cheque, you are expected to go and cash your money.”
On whether government had fulfilled its part of the bargain, the minister said, “absolutely, 100 percent absolutely. That is why I said maybe we should have a high-powered debate before Nigerian public. Let each side state what their issues are, let’s take it one by one. I am assuring Nigerians that as their Minister of Health, on my honour, the federal government, led by President Goodluck Jonathan has done what it ought to do. That is why they signed an MOU. Why will you sign an MOU when you are not satisfied with the negotiation? These two negotiations took place over 24 hours; that is whole day without sleep.”
On what government is doing to ensure Ebola fever does not spread into the country, the minister said since there is no vaccine for the disease, everything depends on surveillance. He said, "In the case of Nigeria, we are carrying out surveillance through our Ports. Health Services at the point of entry. You know again because of the way Nigerian land borders are, sometimes you do have leakages where people just walk across through authorized border areas.
"We are trying to see working with other agencies because we can’t do it alone. We need to work with the Ministry of Agriculture which is currently monitoring the migrant populace. You know people migrate from one reason or the other; they are already monitoring some of them, especially those who are nomad pastoralists.
"We need to work with the Ministry of Interior in terms of checking our borders. What we do is that we watch out for people coming in from these areas, especially people who are travelling from Central Africa. When they come into Nigeria, we need to ensure that we monitor them, track to ensure that even when they have fever, we’ll now make sure what that fever is.
We have put those things in place. "Nigerians should be part of the efforts. It has been shown that in the case of Guinea, bats have played a key role. Bats are also in Nigeria like in many other countries. And, bats, when they harbour this virus, it doesn’t do any harm to bats. But, when people get involved into, maybe, fruits that were eaten by the bats, they inject this virus and it becomes harmful to human beings. It is a very fatal disease. It is like nine out of ten that are affected are likely to die.
So, it is worse than laser fever. Laser is terrible, not to talk of Ebola. "That is why we should commend President Goodluck Jonathan for in Council approving the White Paper that contains that the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control to now be allowed to be run as a parastatal, not just as a department in the Federal Ministry of Health.”
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