The Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) Federal Capital Territory chapter has stepped into the ongoing alleged illegal kidney transplant controversy surrounding Abuja Alliance Hospital.
President of the NMA FCT, Dr. Charles Ugwuanyi who addressed newsmen on Monday in Abuja, clarified that the body was not taking sides, but was interested in ensuring due process was followed and all parties involved were given fair hearing and a balanced judgement.
Ugwuanyi who stated that the cases which were in court needed to have been finalised legally before subjecting the accused hospital to a media trial, noted that some publications could be misleading and one sided and as such, requires an indepth and unbiased investigation to unearth the true situation.
He however appealed to aggrieved patients to always approach the regulatory body and tribunal for medical practitioners in the country, Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN), for any case of alleged medical misconduct, malpractice or other issues they were not satisfied or at peace with.
He said: “We are neither for or against Alliance hospital. Our duty at this point is to create a platform, give the accused an opportunity to say a few words concerning the allegation that has gone viral much to our concern and to also say we are aware some of this matter Is in court.
“Never will NMA at any point in time encourage negligence of duty or malpractice. As a matter of fact the NMA has the Medical and Dental Council that is in charge of regulating practice.
“We always encourage our patients who feel they have not been treated well to please not use violence against us whether physical, emotional or cyber bullying. Please go to the tribunal, trust them they do a thorough job even to the extent of stripping doctors of practice licence so we have internal mechanism to check malpractice.
“Some publications can be misleading and one sided we want a situation where any case is given a balanced judgement by constituted authorities.”
Ugwuanyi who urged the National Assembly to look into the laws governing organ sourcing in Nigeria, noted that it was important to avoid bigger problems in the coming years, as the cases of organ transplant was expected to increase astronomically.
“We have always made it clear that the laws guiding organ harvest, sourcing in Nigeria is still scanty because the laws is rudimentary.
For us at NMA we are already advocating to the regular government authorities, the legislative arm of government to look into the direction because kidney problems requiring transplant and other organ transplant are in the increase so we can project that in the next few years there will be a lot of organ harvesting therefore we must we keep calling legislative arm of government to strengthen laws regarding them.
” Let us see what is happening now as a pointer to bigger problems in the future. Let’s Identify problems at early stage and put out measures to contain them.
“We must also be careful not to discourage those who have ventured into providing these services by being very careful especially when things goes wrong like this. If we put peculiarly interest on this first and encourage this racketeering then we are in a big trouble infact, they can kidnap people to harvest their organs so we need to be very careful,” he warned
Chief Consultant Surgeon/Medical Director Alliance hospital,.Dr. Otabor Christopher, insisted that the news making the rounds about the hospital’s involvement in alleged kidney transplant activities was false, biased and malicious.
According to him there was no “iota of evidence of monetary transactions between the hospital, its staff and the donors or their representatives,” even as he insisted that the rule guiding transplant in the hospital was kidney recipients source for their donors and present them to the hospital for screening for compatibility and fitness for donation.
He said: “After the screening, we proceed to ensure they meet the legal requirements which include that donor must be 18 years or above;donor must sign consent in the presence of two adult witnesses;donor is expected to swear an affidavit stating his age and affirming that the decision to donate is by free will and there is no compulsion or financial inducement and the relationship of the donor to the recipient.”
While noting that the law governing organ transplant in Nigeria was scanty and limited in depth, he added that although It only requires the donor to be above 18 years of age and there was no financial inducement for the donation, skeletal investigations had shown that some of the donors being presented had lied about their age.
While describing the news making the rounds in some part of the media as a campaign of calumny against Alliance hospital, he expressed disappointment that the hospital was being targeted for blackmail even when it knows nothing about such illicit act.”
