Tuesday, 1 November 2016

NMA urges government to address provisions of 2015 Health Act to enable implementation




By Ijendu Iheaka

October 28, 2016


 The Chairman, Nigerian Medical Association, Aba Zone, Dr Udo Mark on Friday said the National Health Act 2015 cannot be implemented without effectively addressing some of  its provisions.
Mark disclosed this during an interview with our reporter in Aba, Abia State.
“The problem we have with the implementation of the National Health Act is that we have people with poor medical knowledge piloting medical affairs of Nigeria.
“And sometimes they do not seek information before they act on some policies or even formulate one.
“The assisted fertility practices are not new but have been going on in some parts of the world. And as countries make policies to regulate and we must also regulate. Of course we cannot exist in isolation.
“But you have to look at what other countries are practicing and adapt your practice to your local needs.
“So the National Health Act cannot take-off effectively without these provisions effectively addressed and these are what want the people in government to understand.
“We ask government to summon the political will to create the enabling environment for its implementation to take off at all the tiers of government”, he said.
Mark condemned the situation where the policy-makers in the Nigerian health sector would give control of the medical sector to non-doctors or paramedics.
He said that unless decisions and resulting actions like the mentioned were curtailed, the Nigerian health sector would continue to suffer setbacks.
NAN reports that some Nigerians including Human Rights Lawyer Femi Falana had kicked against the act for bearing clauses which breached the human rights of Nigerians.
The rights Falana said included “right o life, human dignity, privacy and freedom of thought, conscience and religion by authorizing medical doctors to remove human organs without patient’s consent”.


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