Matilda Omonaiye/
Gunmen have kidnapped Dr Tochukwu Mbanugo, one of Nigeria’s few practising neurosurgeons, shortly after he completed a series of lifesaving brain surgeries at the Nnamdi Azikiwe University Teaching Hospital (NAUTH), Nnewi, Anambra State, throwing the medical community into panic and renewed calls for protection of health workers.
The Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare confirmed that Mbanugo was abducted on Thursday, October 30, around Omatha Junction, Uruagu, Nnewi, while driving home after an intense day in the operating theatre.
According to official reports, he had just performed several critical neurosurgical procedures, including the resection of a complex brain tumour, before the attack.
“The abduction occurred at the very point where he should have been safest, returning home from serving humanity,” the ministry stated.
The ministry described the development as a “direct assault on Nigeria’s health security”, given that the country has fewer than 150 practising neurosurgeons serving over 220 million people.
Against the World Health Organisation benchmark of one neurosurgeon per 100,000 people, Nigeria has only one for nearly two million citizens.
“This makes every specialist we have invaluable. An attack on one specialist doctor is a direct assault on the nation’s health security and a threat to our collective wellbeing,” the statement signed by Minister of State for Health, Dr Iziaq Adekunle Salako, read.
The ministry disclosed that the abductors had since established contact through the doctor’s phone with some of his colleagues.
It added that the case has been reported to the Anambra State Police Command, the Department of State Services, the Anti-Kidnapping Squad, and local vigilante units.
Mbanugo’s abduction comes amid a nationwide strike by resident doctors that has crippled operations in 91 hospitals, further heightening the risks faced by patients in need of emergency neurosurgical care.
The Federal Ministry strongly condemned the attack, describing it as a cruel blow to an already fragile health system.
“Our health workforce — doctors, nurses and allied health professionals — are national assets working under immense pressure to save lives. They must be protected and respected, not harmed or hunted,” it said.
The ministry also called on the Anambra State Government and all security agencies to intensify efforts to locate and rescue the neurosurgeon “immediately, safely and unconditionally.”
0Related posts:
Orthodox Medicine Versus Natural Medicine – Femi Kusa
2 Nigerians, Imam on List of 32 London Sex Offenders Jailed This Year
Internal Security Dynamics and the Imperative of a New Policing Thought in Nigeria
FG Presents Buhari’s Scorecard
Anambra Monarch, Igwe Kenneth Orizu, Marks 100th Birthday, 62 Years on the Throne
Interrogating Two Years of Nigeria’s Foreign Policy Under President Tinubu