HURIWA calls for state of emergency on high cost of medication

Civil Society organization, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has called on President Bola Tinubu to declare a state of emergency on medication and the high cost of pharmaceutical products in the country.

HURIWA in a statement by its National Coordinator Emmanuel Onwubiko, while raising alarm on the rising cost of medication said the situation is a threat to life.

Onwubiko, said the right to affordable and quality healthcare is a fundamental human right noting that it is unacceptable that citizens are unable to afford essential medication, while their leaders who are funded by taxpayers live in luxury.

“We are of the position that at no other time in the history of Nigeria as a sovereignty, has it become practically impossible for millions of indigent citizens living with one health condition or the other that can medically be managed by adherence to a regime of medication at the expert recommendation of medical doctors, who can no longer afford these lifesaving medicines and most people with such situations are now in-between the devil and the deep blue sea,” Onwubiko said.

The statement which blamed the situation on the poor framing and implementation of critical economic policies such as the sudden withdrawal of subsidy on petrol and the flouting of the value of Naira vis-a-vis that of other foreign monetary notes such as the United States’ dollars, stressed that nobody should fall sick and die because they cannot afford medication.

He called on government to implement measures to lift certain restrictions and tariffs on imported lifesaving pharmaceutical products into Nigeria and urged state governments to introduce health subsidy to benefit their indigent citizens.