By Moyosore Shittu
The state of Nigeria’s healthcare sector is degenerating by the day, but we have become so accustomed to the dysfunction that we have stopped seeing the problem. However, I think it’s high time we swallowed the bitter pill: many of our hospitals are nothing but glorified first-aid centres. The purpose of a hospital is to serve as a sanctuary in times of medical crisis, yet lives are lost because these so-called sanctuaries cannot live up to their names. We need to see this for what it really is: it is not just an infrastructure failure, but a systemic breakdown that requires urgent attention.
A hospital’s primary duty is to save lives, and this is the core reason for its existence. It should be a place of hope, and a place of refuge for people who seek solace and healing, but in this part of the world, the reverse is the case.
Picture this: you are in a car accident late at night on a highway, bleeding heavily, and someone rushes you to the nearest hospital, but instead of being wheeled into an emergency room with trained professionals ready to stabilise you, you are asked whether you have money for a card, whether you brought a relative along, or even worse, you’re told bluntly that the hospital lacks the basic tools that are needed to save you. Every second that ticks away brings you closer to death, yet the place that should be your safety net has become your biggest nightmare. This is the reality of thousands of Nigerians every year.
Imagine how traumatic it is, to rush a person to the hospital, only to be greeted with the words, “we don’t have the equipment to handle this. You have to go to another hospital.” So the patient, who is already in a critical state, is yet again forced to endure a life-or-death journey to another hospital, with their chances of survival diminishing as the clock ticks. People should not have to embark on a frantic search for another hospital while their life hangs in the balance for any reason!
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A hospital’s inability to attend to a patient is a problem, but it’s a bigger problem when it’s a “we don’t have this equipment, so you should go to this hospital” situation. This is proof that our hospitals are failing the most basic tests, and are slowly becoming the people’s nightmare. The absence of something as common as an oxygen tank in a licensed hospital is a clear indictment of our regulatory bodies, because oxygen is not a luxury, but a necessity. No hospital should open its doors without having such basic facilities, but in Nigeria, this is tolerated as though it were normal.
When an asthmatic person cannot get access to an inhaler or oxygen tank in a supposed hospital, what does that say about the credibility of that institution? When a pregnant woman with complications is told to try another hospital because the hospital has no incubator or a functional surgical ward, what message are we passing across? These are not fictional; they are stories that have been told by families who have buried their loved ones prematurely. Oxygen, gloves, syringes, blood bags, defibrillators are not luxuries, they are the bare minimum requirements for any hospital worth its name.
Some people argue that the high cost of medical equipment is prohibitive, but this is not a plausible excuse. If regulators can insist that banks must hold billions in share capital before being granted a licence, why do we allow hospitals; establishments that literally hold lives in their hands to operate without even a functioning ambulance? Is the preservation of human life not worth at least as much as the protection of deposits?
In the banking sector, individuals and entities have to pool their resources to meet a capital requirement, which is why you don’t see random banks sprouting out of nowhere, because the system is designed to ensure security for the public, but I cannot help but wonder why this same level of accountability is not demanded in the medical sector. There is absolutely no reason why private hospital owners cannot also pool their resources to acquire the necessary equipment to save lives. It’s not just about money; it’s about a commitment to public welfare. The health and safety of the public should be a priority, not an afterthought.
