In quality healthcare delivery, Lagos State is in a class of its own – a leader far ahead of all other subnational governments. From world-class medical infrastructure and ancillaries that make things happen, the Centre of Excellence never stops striving to improve on its track record of excellence in the health sector. Now, with top-notch technocrats like Prof. Akin Abayomi on the list of 39 cabinet nominees recently transmitted by Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu to the Lagos State House of Assembly for screening and confirmation, health sector in the state seems set for more remarkable years. Associate Editor ADEKUNLE YUSUF and ROBERT EGBE report
Perhaps in admission that leadership is indeed an obligation, Lagos State has often showed five qualities: setting an example, be an inspiration, acting as a talent advocator, be visionary and exceptionally bold in strategic thinking. This obligation for excellence is a responsibility the state government has openly recognised in the introductory statement on its official website (https://lagosstate.gov.ng/). “Welcome to Lagos State. The Centre of Excellence has a duty to lead. Our government has taken bold steps to always ensure that Lagos State maintains that leadership position. This is identified in the agenda of this government,” it ambitiously declared.
Although the exciting moniker, “Centre of Excellence,” is unarguably catchy and classy, it also places a huge responsibility on the state to always stand out and deliver services that gel with people’s individual and collective expectations and aspirations. Already, Lagos, with an economy larger than that of all but eight African countries – Nigeria, South Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya and Ghana, Egypt, Algeria and Morocco – leads as Nigeria’s economic nerve centre. No doubt, Lagos, with its trademark hustle and bustle, is the envy of other states.
Truly, keen watchers of development events in Lagos know for a fact that the agenda statement referenced above is the driving force that birthed the T.H.E.M.E.S agenda, an acronym for “Transportation and Traffic Management; Health and Environment; Education and Technology; Making Lagos State a 21st Century Megacity, Entertainment & Tourism; and Security & Governance,” upon which Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s administration’s vision for the state is anchored since 2019.
As the 2023 general elections have come and gone, Lagos, like its counterparts in the remaining 35 states, now has another opportunity to cement its place as the land of opportunities – a place Nigerians from all backgrounds and walks of life readily come to and be proud to call their home. As if by divine foresight, Governor Sanwo-Olu, in 2019, appointed Prof Abayomi, a renowned specialist in internal medicine, haematology, biosecurity, environmental health and human development, as the Commissioner for Health. This singular appointment was to prove rewarding for Lagos and Nigeria – just ahead of the COVID-19 global pandemic that almost paralysed the world. As usual, Lagos further used its management of the COVID-19 crisis to further showcase and prove its claim to being the true centre of excellence. With Governor Sanwo-Olu as the ‘Incident Commander’ and Prof. Abayomi as his deputy, Lagos blazed the trail in COVID-19 surveillance, testing, clinical management, risk communication and vaccination. The novel command structure put in place was able to rally and coordinate human and material resources to combat the dreaded global pandemic, which ravaged most developed countries of the world, earning Lagos national and international recognitions as a model state for health emergency preparedness and response.
An alumnus of the Royal Medical College of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital at the University of London, with fellowships from both the Royal College of Medicine and Pathology in the United Kingdom and the College of Medicine of South Africa, Abayomi has, for years, focused on the concept of emerging infectious diseases and the development of laboratory and clinical capacity in Africa. Having worked in diverse countries of the world, the don was also the Chief Pathologist and Head of the Division of Haematology at the University of Stellenbosch’s Faculty of Medicine Science in 2009 in Cape Town, South Africa, a Consultant at the University of West Indies and the University of Zimbabwe and has been exposed to a vast variety of geographical variations and disease patterns within the field of Internal Medicine.
Abayomi was the Chair of the H3Africa Consortium Data and Bio-specimen Access Committee, as well as the Founder of the Global Emerging Pathogen Consortium which was entrenched at the peak of the Ebola outbreak to address Biosecurity concerns in Africa. He was a Consultant to the Lagos State Biosecurity and Genomics Project in 2014. Abayomi was also a member of the African Academy of Science Committee on Data Governance and also the Lead Consultant on the Bio-bank, Biosecurity and Bio-data Rescue project in Sierra Leone and Lagos Nigeria. He is consulting for the Lagos State Biosecurity project and the West Africa Health Organisation Bio-security and Bio-banking framework to service the ECOWAS member.
A massive boost for healthcare delivery
While Governor Sanwo-Olu’s administration has had its fair share of challenges, it has also recorded remarkable achievements in several areas. One such area is health and environment. The state’s medical infrastructure has seen a tremendous upgrade in the last four years. During Abayomi’s tenure as the number one health officer in Lagos State, the health sector got massive boosts in both human capital and medical infrastructure development, resulting in improved health indices, including health promotion, disease prevention and control, reduction of maternal and child mortality, improved access to quality and affordable health services, better health financing approach, beneficial hand-shake with the private sector and improved partnership with health development partners.
During his first four years as the Commissioner for Health, medical infrastructure at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels wore a new look. Through revamping of existing medical infrastructure and building of new ones, Lagos State was able to increase access to quality and efficient health services for citizens and ensure a better working environment for its health workforce. Amongst the critical medical infrastructure projects that Abayomi is helping to midwife is the 150-bed Massey Street Children Hospital, which when completed, will arguably be the best children’s hospital in Sub-Saharan Africa; the new 280-bed Ojo General Hospital; the 1500-bed Psychiatric Hospital and Rehabilitation Centre at Ikosi-Ejirin, Infectious Disease Research Institute and Doctors’ Quarters at LASUTH, Ojo and Gbagada General Hospitals.
His unique idea of converting brain drain to brain gain through massive medical infrastructure overhaul, capacity building for human resource for health and welfarist agenda for health workers has become a brooding model and subject of discourse in different fora. With a conviction that a health system is a true reflection of its human resource capacity, Abayomi ensured training, re-training, capacity building and certification of over 8,000 health workers and recruitment of over 3,000 to improve service delivery and meet the growing health needs of residents.
In the last four years, Abayomi has changed public perception about health service delivery in Nigeria and Sub-Saharan, particularly as it relates to regulation, financing and partnerships. Under his watch, over 800,000 residents were covered under the Lagos State Health Scheme, rebranded as Ilera-Eko. His unique leadership style of regular public engagements, public speaking and press and public relations activities helped ensure citizens’ buy-in and ownership of various health policies, programmes and projects of the Lagos State Government. By all standards, Abayomi exceeded the demands and roles of his office as the Lagos State Commissioner for Health, clearly setting standards, creating records and surpassing same in the same breath. Little wonder, he was named in the 39 cabinet nominees recently transmitted by Governor Sanwo-Olu to the Lagos State House of Assembly for screening and confirmation.
Projects include the completion and equipping of four maternal and childcare centres at Eti-Osa, Alimosho, Badagry and Epe, the building and activation of 10 triage and oxygen centres across the state, and the activation of two oxygen plants at Mainland Hospital, Yaba and Gbagada General Hospital. There has also been the comprehensive renovation and refurbishment of public health facilities including the General Hospital, Ebute-Meta, General Hospital, Harvey Road, General Hospital, Odan, General Hospital, Isolo and General Hospital Ketu-Ejirini.
Many primary health facilities have also been renovated. They include Pota PHC, Badagry, Ijegun PHC, Igando-Ikotun, Alausa PHC, Ikeja, Ojodu PHC, Ojodu, Onigbongbo PHC Otumara PHC, Lagos Mainland, Mascara PHC, Agboyi-Ketu, Oworo PHC, Kosofe, Cele- Apata PHC Ayobo, Dauda-Ilo PHC, Ejgbo, Olorunda PHC, Ikorodu, Oki PHC, Agbado Oke-Odo, Losi Oba PHC, Ikorodu North PHC, and Afuye PHC, Epe. There are several ongoing projects, including the construction of the 150-bed New Massey Street Children’s Hospital, Lagos Island, with a Multi-Layer Car Park. Others are construction of 280-bed General Hospital in Ojo, 1,500-bed Psychiatric Hospital & Rehabilitation Centre, Ketu-Ejirin, doctors’ quarters at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), General Hospital Gbagada and Ojo General Hospital Site, construction of a proposed 300-Bed Isolation Centre at Mainland Hospital, Yaba (Design Ready), construction of Infectious Disease Research Centre at Mainland Hospital, Yaba (Design Ready), procurement and installation of two high-capacity incinerators at Mainland and Ikorodu General Hospitals and acquisition of land for Orile-Agege General Hospital, among others.
The state has also got over 800,000 Lagosians covered under the Lagos Health Insurance Scheme (Ilera Eko, inaugurated five Ilera-Eko Divisional Offices at Ikorodu, Ikeja, Badagry, Lagos Island and Epe, procured a Floating Clinic Boat’; a Fiber Glass, Mono Hull Boat 400HP capacity, water ambulance, for inland waterways medical emergency and riverine communities medical outreach services as part of efforts to increase access to prompt, qualitative and efficient health care services on the waterways and riverine communities, acquired MGI DNBSEQ-G400 Sequencing Machine and a complete work station for sequencing of COVID variants and other pathogens. This health infrastructure; the first of its kind in Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa is geared towards improving the diagnosis, research and outbreak investigation capacity of the Lagos State Biobank (LSB) to promptly detect and understand the genomics of pathogens of high consequences and infectious diseases.
Those close to him often mention his resilient spirit and goal-getting attitude, which became even more evident in Abayomi’s quest and constant striving for health system strengthening and improved health outcomes, which he said is tied to the apron string of good public-private partnership. His innate qualities reached a crescendo during the global COVID-19 pandemic response when his crisis management skills; epidemiology, biosecurity and global health knowledge and experience; and his unique ability to work under intense pressure came to light, earning him national honours and awards including, the National Productivity Order of Merit (NPOM) award and Officer of the Order of Niger (OON) by the Federal Government of Nigeria in recognition of his high productivity, hard work and excellence in Nigeria’s health sector especially in the fight against COVID-19. It is on record that Abayomi’s Lagos blazed the trail in COVID-19 surveillance, testing, clinical management, risk communication and vaccination exercise. Like the owl that he is, working round the clock all day, every day, Abayomi and his team doled out reports, statistics and policy shifts that helped flatten the curve of successive COVID-19 waves.
It was thus no surprise his help was sought at the national level and his unique model of home-based care, testing strategy in partnership with the private sector and quarantine was adopted by the Federal Government. It was again, little wonder Governor Sanwo-Olu attributed his biggest achievement in health to getting Lagos out of the COVID-19 pandemic. This achievement no doubt is that of the governor as well as the team of incredible health and frontline workers led by Prof. Abayomi. Aside from his remarkable and excellent stint with public health emergency response management, Abayomi has proven that the landscape of medical infrastructure which is usually deplorable in this part of the world can witness remarkable turnaround with good leadership prowess, commitment and passion.
