ON March 26, the Nigerian Medical Association, NMA, Kano State branch urged its members to make use of their two months hazard allowance in the face of COVID – 19 pandemic, to purchase Personal Protective Equipment, PPE, for themselves in health facilities where it is unavailable.

In a memo announced by the association which was confirmed by the state chairman, Sanusi Muhd Bala, to The ICIR, it cited the rising number of COVID – 19 infections among doctors and health workers globally, which it described as alarming. The doctors were advised to consider the move as a priority to protect themselves while carrying out their duties.

Speaking to The ICIR in a telephone interview, Bala painted a grim picture of scarce protective equipment for doctors in the state, and their anxieties with the government for failing to adequately prepare for a potential COVID – 19 outbreak.

“The government has failed to make protective kits available to health workers despite the repeated appeal we’ve made to them in the past, especially during the Lassa fever outbreak in Kano State which claimed the lives of two doctors earlier this year who contracted the disease from their patients,” he said.

Muhammed Bala, a consultant nephrologist at the Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Kano and currently overseeing the welfare of doctors in the state, is one of the thousands of doctors in Nigeria without PPE, including masks, gowns and eye gear while treating patients.

“The hazard fee paid to doctors in this country is N5,000 which is very small, for instance, if a doctor on the frontline contracts a disease while treating a patient and loses his life there is no financial cover or insurance that covers him or his family.

“When we lost two doctors to Lassa fever early this year their families were given N1 million each and that was the end of it no other form of compensation has been made to-date, despite our letter to them,” he said.

Though Kano State has not officially recorded a confirmed case of COVID – 19, the lack of critical infrastructure for doctors is a source for worry in case of an outbreak.

For doctors at the forefront of containing the COVID -19 pandemic in Nigeria, the federal government pays doctors in public hospitals a monthly hazard fee of N5,000 monthly, which is equivalent to $13.64, for any risk they might encounter while carrying out their duties.

Their counterparts in Sierra Leone who attend to Ebola patients earn $115 weekly for the period they are working, which translates into a monthly payment of $460, more than 30 times what is earned by Nigerian doctors as hazard claims.

In Liberia, during the Ebola epidemic, which claimed the lives of 95 medical personnel, the Liberian government-paid health workers in the frontlines a monthly hazard pay of $435 while doctors received $825 monthly apart from their salaries which was almost doubled.

However, in some other African countries, the situation is different as doctors are not paid hazard allowances but have compulsory insurance indemnities for medical induced risks they could face in the course of offering treatment to patients.

READ MORE: https://www.icirnigeria.org/what-is-the-worth-of-a-nigerian-doctor-treating-covid-19-patient/

It is what it is... I just hope the generation of our Children will do better than what the generation of our fathers left behind.

Everything in this nation is upside down... It pays to be a politician...

For those always attacking doctors..can you see where the real problem comes from

drskyfly007:
For those always attacking doctors..can you see where the real problem comes from

Those idiots don't even read.