Akande seeks establishment of more medical varsities

Former governor of Osun State, Bisi Akande, at the weekend, called for the creation of more medical universities to take care of the dearth of professionals in the country.

He made the appeal while speaking with journalists shortly after a facility tour of the Federal University of Health Sciences, Ila-Orangun, Osun State.

The ex-governor commended the management of the university over what he described as phenomenal growth in the infrastructure on the campus. His words: “For the job done so far, I am highly impressed. I have never seen a university grow at this phenomenal rate in infrastructure all my life. “I am grateful to the vice-chancellor and the management for their bold vision and accomplishments thus far.

“When my friends in the government of the All Progressives Congress (APC) decided to put the university here, I was very happy, but my impression of a medical science university was a mere hospital, and at the beginning, I was always coming here. But today, I realise that the university is quite different from the hospital, and I realise that the hospital is a mere laboratory for the university.

“The statisticians will tell you that you need certain number of doctors for certain numbers of population, but Nigeria is far below that recommendation and advantage, so for a medical science university, I would love to see more of it in the country because health is wealth.” On his part, the vice-chancellor, Prof. Wale Lasisi, disclosed that the institution’s teaching hospital could take off next year.