The forthcoming quadrennial National Delegates Conference of the Nigerian Union of Allied Health Professionals (NUAHP) is set to proffer solutions that would curb alarming brain drain of healthcare workers with a view to creating an enabling environment for the professionals to thrive in their duties.
This will be the highlight of the NUAHP’s conference tagged ‘Abuja City Conference’ with the theme: ‘Alarming Brain Drain in Nigeria’s Health Sector: Need for Emergency Rescue’.
The conference with the sub theme ‘Non-Implementation of Collective Bargaining Agreements: A Major Factor to Industrial Disharmony In Nigeria’s Health Sector’ is scheduled to hold from June 19 to 23 at the Top Rank Hotels, Utako in Abuja. Announcing the conference, the National President of NUAHP, Dr. Obinna Ogbonna, said, “People will see the need to cry out to the government to look into the health system of Nigeria in order to create an enabling environment for healthcare professionals.”
According to Ogbonna who is also the vice chairman of the Joint Health Sector Union (JOHESU), the reason for the quadrennial delegates conference is to elect a new National Administrative Council Executive to run the union for the next four years and also map out strategies to help the country retain its medical workforce.
He said that the conference was open to members of the public to come and join in the deliberations on the vital issue of the continuous exodus of health workers of all cad- res of healthcare professionals in the country. “A lot of healthcare workers are leaving the shores of the nation due to non-availability of equipment, harsh environment, etc and can’t give the best care to patients, leaving a few professionals to care for too many patients. To this end, care workers collapse and sometimes die while giving care to patients. There is a need to circumvent the situation.” He expressed hope that the confer- ence would help implement policies and find ways to stop the brain drain that has led to exhaustion in the en- tire health sector.
