The Federal Government has launched a digital health platform capable of saving Nigeria $1.2bn spent annually on outbound medical tourism, according to top officials.
Launching the NigcomHealth digital platform in Abuja yesterday, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, said the online hospital would use disruptive technology to improve access to health care services across the country.
“The practice of medical tourism where the more privileged Nigerians travel abroad for better medical service is hoped to reduce drastically through the NigComHealth programme, where easy access to first-class medical practitioners would be made available to all Nigerians via NigComHealth digital Platform. Based on the data from the Nigeria Health Facility Registry (NHFR), Nigeria has a total of 39,914 operational hospitals and clinics”, Pantami said.
He quoted a report that the doctor-patient ratio in Nigeria was getting worse, with a physician attending to over 5,000 patients.
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This, according to him, represents a stark contrast with WHO’s recommendation of 1 doctor to 600 patients.
“With 218 million people to cater for, Nigeria requires at least 363,000 additional doctors to meet this target”, he said.
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