Resolutions of the 51st National Council on Health Meeting: Responses

I have had a number of responses since I published the last post. The response below is from one aggrieved anonymous writer. Please read.

Dear Doctor,
why do you think it is at a conference so vital to the health of Nigeria that the development and use of Nicosan for sickle cell anemia is not even mentioned at this meeting?Here we have a drug that was developed by the Nigerian government and approved by NAFDAC but absolutely no urgency about getting it to the people who need it.The single mention of sickle cell comes with the only focus being the need for vaccinations in those people afflicted for influenza. Granted those people are at risk due to their physical state but that would not be the case if they were being treated with Nicosan.If Nicosan can return 50% of sickled cells to normal, improve the patient's health and end sickle cell crises would it not stand to reason that their health would be improved enough that they would not be at high risk for influenza?Why is the government not focusing on the distribution of a drug the Nigerian people have paid to develop and is good enough to be granted orphan drug status by the FDA and EU?What is wrong with Nigeria that almost 20 months after the approval of the drug that the government has yet to do anything about making this treatment available to the more than 4 million Nigerians who need it?The vast majority of deaths in childern under the age of 5 years born with sickle cell is not from influenza but from the genetic disease process itself. Focusing on influenza vaccines brought in from foreign countries vs treating the disease state itself with the indigenous drug Nicosan just doesn't make sense. If this is the approach Nigeria plans to take to meet it's Millinium goals of 2012 I am fairly confident they will fail. One of the most effective ways for Nigeria to reduce it's infant/maternal death rate would be to subsidize Nicosan distribution. So what's the government really doing when it chooses to support initiatives that preclude utilizing treatments that public monies have been spent to develop in favor of tertiary prophylactics like vaccinations? Vaccinations are not substitute for health. Prevention of infection does not come close to the benefits of treating the root cause of ill health. The Nigerian people should rise up and ask the government where the drug their tax dollars created is for them!

Posted by Anonymous to AdvocateHealth! at 4:47 AM