By Okey Muogbo
President Muhammadu Buhari has called for sustained efforts to curtail medical tourism by Nigerians as a means of boosting the country’s economy.
He made the call on Tuesday in Abuja while commissioning the Skipper Eye-Q Super Specilty Eye Hospital, an initiative two two Indians.
Buhari, represented by the Minister of State for Education, Hon. Goodluck Opia said good eye sight is a component of good health and expressed happiness with the efforts of the owners, Mr Jitender Sachdeva who is the investor and Dr Ajay Sharma, an Optomologist heading the hospitals for the setting up the facility.
In his sppech, Mr Sachdeva who is also a major player in the Energy sector disclosed that he started his hospital business in 2007 adding that the Skipper Eye-Q is operating in nine countries across the world.
According to him, the hospitals have treated 7.5 million patients in Nigeria in addition to thousands of suggeries carried out by its doctors and medical personeel all of whom are Nigerians and only one Indian Doctor who works with them.
Dr Sharma in his own speech disclosed that the Skipper Eye-Q Hospital has facilities to treat any kind of eye problem.
According to him, the Abuja Hospital is the 3rd and the largest in Nigeria having established two hospitals in Lagos adding that the Hospital, with the support of Nigerians, would tackle eye problems and reduce medical tourism by Nigerians as their medical bills were cheaper than going to India.
One of the dignitries present, Senator Musa Daggash commended the contributions of the promoters of the Hospital in provision of Energy and medical facilities and urged them to even do more.
Daggash disclosed that he had known Mr Sachdeva for over 20 years describing him as a man gets his job done to specifications and maintains good relationship with Nigerians.
“India has been of help to Nigerians on health matters; those who can’t afford European and American costs run to India where there is less expensive medicare. For Indians to come to Nigeria to set up medical facilities is an added advantage.
“We are very happy to have this in Abuja, we don’t have to go to Lagos again.
“Make this facility available for our teaching hospitals so that we can use them to train more optomologists in the country”, Daggash added.
Also speaking, the president of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), Abuja branch, Dr Charles Ugwuani lamented the problem of brain drain in Nigeria and called on the government to attend to the cries of the NMA on Nigeria’s declining health indices.
