In Nigeria, Accidents have become ghastly daily incidents that culminate invariably in either threat to life or loss of life or both.
No one is spared in this epidemic span, not even the rich business executives: they also have plane crashes to contend with. No one is indeed exempted from the contagious grip of road mishaps and what is frustrating about them is that they can be averted.
These deaths are needless and if only Nigeria regarded data as a way of valid retrospective assessment, the statistics would not only be alarming enough to push government into action, it would also will even citizens into reaction.
I became obsessed with the idea of compiling an IFEMED edition on trauma before my first accident. And even after my second accident, I find the urge more irresistible especially as almost everyone has a sad story relating to road traffic accidents: from a co-passenger in an interstate vehicle who lost a younger cousin to a motor-bike mishap in Abuja to a respected obstetrician who remembered the many deaths that dotted his medical student days courtesy the old Ibadan-Ife road.
I am sure we are wont to say that there is a new Ibadan-Ife road but there are also new and perhaps more deaths consequently; every so often, a police area command Isuzu or more recently a F.R.S.C emergency van speeds into the O.A.U.T.H.C laden with casualties in its backseat. Nothing has changed.
Apart from the fact that it is mostly the active and independent part of the population that is affected, the funds, time and other resources (see orthopaedic wards as regards prolonged hospital stay) is in excess of the cost of prevention. Accidents have gradually progressed from infrequent life-altering encounters to daily collective suicides.(see F.R.S.C facebook group status update)
By compiling a multi-disciplinary approach on medical emergencies with an emphatic lilt on trauma, we have neither assessed nor changed the outcome of road traffic accidents, unarguably the most frequent cause of accident and emergency admission in our locality. We have only reiterated the principles of saving lives which every doctor or doctor-in-training must concern him/herself with.
And who says that we have done anything heroic? Or even relevant? As an aside, it is noteworthy that books are the most obvious hiding places for knowledge especially for Africa, how much more a specialised periodical? It is also noteworthy that there is no functional association that look into Medical emergencies in Nigeria be it a professional association, government parastatal or Non Governmental Organisation save the fatigued Red Cross Association of Nigeria.
Prevention is the most relevant trend which Nigeria as a nation and Africa as a gloomy continent are yet to adopt as their brain children. The import of good governance and consequent tremendous manifestations by way of good road and better transportation networks(see Ogere trailer park and other road-vehicular nuisances), foolproof legislations catering to the immediate and long term needs of transportation in Nigeria and CPR for previously vibrant organisations concerned with transportation and its intricacies cannot be over-emphasised. In my humble opinion, road traffic accidents should glean as much negative publicity as HIV/AIDS as in the last decade, perhaps then we would need to regard it with as much urgency and momentum, for indeed it kills faster than even the Hepatitis viral infection.
I have been a direct victim of road traffic accidents, I have been subdued under the influence of trauma and I have also found out that mistakes are just as inevitable as outcomes. Reckless driving and casual flouting of road signs and traffic laws are important causes of road traffic accident but they must not be marketed as though they are the chief reasons why road mishaps happen.
Portraying this rather myopic and insensate line of thought can be akin to treating symptoms instead of underlying causes, and this is nothing short of useless therapy, if that term is expressive of my ideals. The underlying problem with Nigeria is ignorance and its endless sequelae, malignant spread, which for the benefit of this essay, is not in tandem with my scope of discuss. (see Nigerian newspapers).
My objective is to right myself a motive behind channelling all the focus and funds at IFEMED’s disposal into the pursuance of what some have termed as an “echolalia” of better periodical contemporaries(see DOKITA, Ibadan). But to get a clear picture, a large canvass on which I can spot my thoughts is necessary, hence my endless purposeful digression on governance, transportation and all the major players involved.
The bottom-line assessment is that road traffic accidents have become a contagious disease been spread by a major vector in Nigeria, Ignorance and its octopodus manifestations, and if definitive plans of extinguishing this vector is not put in place, we shall be eternally busy as doctors treating symptoms and signs rather than diagnosis.
