FG Earmarks 8 Teaching Hospitals for Support Facilities

Hammed Shittu in Ilorin.

Federal government has earmarked eight university teaching hospitals in the country for significant support for facilities improvement in the 2018 budget and next year budget, so as to make the affected hospitals centres for medical tourism destination in Africa.

The Chairman, Board of the Governing Council of University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital (UITH, Ilorin), High Chief Otega Emerhor dropped the hint to journalists recently, shortly after the maiden meeting of the governing council of the hospital held in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital.

According to him,” the decision of the federal government is to discourage Nigerians travelling overseas and also to ensure that, other people outside the country can come to Nigeria for medical treatment.”

He said that, “the main vision of the present administration led by President Muhammadu Buhari is to ensure health situation in Nigeria improves rapidly, that our hospitals, teaching hospitals are functional at optimum position and the government is driving towards this objective.

He added that, “As you know that, UITH, Ilorin, was a long standing teaching hospital in Nigeria. It has been established since 1980, it has made its name among its peers as a progressive teaching hospital, the previous board has achieved a lot, they had moved from temporary site to permanent site that accommodated a lot of facilities and we are going to improve on this so as to bring healthcare delivery to the teeming populace of the country.”

On the issue of labour crisis on ground at the teaching hospital, Otega said, “there is no way we can improve on our services to the patients without carrying along our staff that will perform the operations or taking care of the patients and it is important we motivate them.

“The staff will be well paid, they will be promoted in line with the objective we brought to the hospital and we know there are issues on ground as we have met with the labour leaders and senior staff and we are going to carry them along and prioritise their demands so that we can meet their demands.”

The chairman who also said that, the board would collaborate with private organisations in the bid to develop the hospital added that, the development would complement the efforts of the government in the bid to move the hospital forward.

He also assured that, the board would strive harder to garner more funds through the best services being rendered to the patients.