‘Nigeria loses more than annual budget on road crashes’

Stakeholders on road safety in the country have said that Nigeria loses more than its annual budget on road crashes every year.

National focal person UN-Decade of Action on Road Safety and Injury Prevention, Nigeria Dr. Sydney Ibeanusi revealed that Nigeria can increase its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by reducing road crashes.

Ibeanusi said that other countries like India and Tanzania have recorded an increase in their GDP by reducing road crashes in their country.

He said this in Abuja, at the World day of remembrance for road traffic victims 2018. Themed ‘Roads have stories, for happy endings, lets improve road safety.’

His words, “Development depends on getting road safety right, it has happened in other countries, India was able to increase her GDP by 22% by ensuring that they reduced road crashes by 50%, even Tanzania have been able to do that, they increased their GDP by 7.2%, it can be done in Nigeria.

“We lose more than our annual budget, every year on road crashes, if for instance our annual budget was N8.3trl this year, we lose more than that every year on the roads from road crashes both from the people that died and the survivals who are unable to work and of course the indirect consequences are huge with people losing their breadwinners with huge social consequences.”

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Minister of State for Health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire at the occasion said that the Federal Government has adopted a policy where the bills of emergency treatments cases in hospitals are paid for by the government.

His words, “On the side of the government is the prompt response and appropriate treatment of victims of road crashes. The Federal Ministry of Health has lunched a policy of the National Emergency Medical Services and Ambulance Scheme to coordinate all the medical emergencies and ambulance services in the country, it is called NEMSAS.

“It has been approved by the National Council on Health and to be inaugurated soon. The role and term of reference is to ensure that residents have access to prompt medical services. In the basic health care provision fund of the Federal Government is reserved for emergency medical care and the NEMSAS committee will be responsible for the fund.

“The fund will be used to reduce loss of lives that occur when people are brought to the hospital and they dont have money on them. The hope is that the fund will offer treatment free of charge for every person that is brought in for the first two days until they are stabilized, so nobody will be left unattended.

“Therefore the idea of payment before service in an emergency needs to be addressed and cancelled so that every one will be taken care of.”