Group seeks FG support to establish liver transplant centres
The Africa Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Cancer Consortium says it is willing to partner with the Federal Government to establish the first liver transplant centre in Nigeria.
The AHPBCC Team Lead in Nigeria, Dr. Abidemi Omonisi, said the establishment of a liver transplant centre in Nigeria was long overdue as many other African countries have it.
Omonisi, in a statement on Tuesday, lamented that Nigerians with liver cancer and other conditions still need to fly abroad for treatment while many poor citizens who cannot afford foreign treatment are left to die.
This trend, he said, must be reverse, calling for a Memorandum of Understanding between AHPBCC and the Federal Government to establish a liver transplant centre in each of the country’s geopolitical zones.
Omonisi said, “The initiative will be extended to the six geopolitical zones in the country to ensure that liver cancer patients and others with end-stage liver diseases can access liver transplants in Nigeria at an affordable cost.
“Many of our patients with liver cancer in Nigeria cannot afford to travel abroad to access liver transplants. They are treated symptomatically until death. This situation must change for good in Nigeria.
“If Egypt, South Africa, Uganda, Sudan, Côte d’Ivoire, and other African countries can establish such programs, I believe it is very possible to set up a liver transplant programme not only in Kano but across all six geopolitical zones in Nigeria.”
Omonisi noted that the initiative to establish a liver transplant centre in Nigeria had been under discussion for many years, emphasising that it was time to make it a reality.
Omonisi explained that AHPBCC, led by Dr. Lewis Roberts, was created to harness resources and expertise across Africa, the United States, and Europe to investigate the influences of lifestyle, environment, viral, and host biological factors on the development of hepato-pancreato-biliary cancers.
The President of the Society for Gastroenterology and Hepatology in Nigeria, Prof. Jesse Otegbayo, who is the Chief Medical Director of the University College Hospital, Ibadan, lauded AHPBCC for the initiative.
Otegbayo pledged the support of SOGHIN—a national association of medical professionals involved in the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of diseases of the gastrointestinal tract and liver—to ensure the success of the programme.
