JOURNALISTS FOR MAPUTO ACTION PLAN

West African Surgeons To Carry Out Vast Surgical Operations In Cameroon

The 56^th annual conference of the West African College of Surgeons (WACS) will hold in Cameroon from February 14-28, 2016 with one of the highlights being free surgical operation of some 400 patients with surgical problems.

 

The president of the college, Nigerian born Prof Akinyinka O. Omigbodun was in the country for a three day pre-conference visit in which he met with members of the local organizing committee headed by Prof Fru Angwafor III, also Managing Director of the Yaounde Gynaco-Obstetric and Pediatric hospital.

 “We are also mounting an outreach activity; a surgical outreach where patients who have surgical problems will actually be treated free of charge during the period immediately leading up to the conference,” the WACS president told journalists in Yaounde on Sunday.

Prof Akinyinka was accompanied to Cameroon by a delegation comprising the immediate past president of the college.

According to Prof Akinyinka, surgeons from other parts of the world; who are not member countries of the 18 mandate region and non-fellows of the sub region will join WACS fellows to deliver surgical services to the people of Cameroon.

Sustainable Development Goals

 “Apart from the 18 countries that are in the mandate region of the West African College of Surgeons, we have colleagues who are coming from other parts of the world from the United Kingdom, France, the United States, Canada and even as far as Australia,” he explained.

Discussions during the two weeks conference will center on the role of surgeons in fostering the accomplishment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

“We want to key in on this new initiative to make life better for our people, to bring development to our own part of the world and we want to look at the various issues that link the practice of the various surgical disciplines towards the accomplishment of those goals,” Prof Akinyinka said.

It will be the 4^th time Cameroon will be hosting the annual conference of the West African College of Surgeons and according to the president, the college has an emotional attachment to Cameroon.

Prof Victor Anomah Ngu

“One of the founding fathers of our college, the late Prof Victor Anomah Ngu is from Cameroon here and he was actually the first protagonist of the idea of starting the association of surgeons of West Africa, the organization that eventually became the West African College of Surgeons.”

The late Prof Victor Anomah Ngu was a researcher, one time minister of Public Health. Before his demise, he became famous after concocting VANHIVAX, a vaccine he affirmed was a cure to HIV/AIDS.

The West African College of Surgeons (WACS) was created in 1960 as an association of surgeons practicing in West Africa. With just 15 member countries at inception, the association that metamorphosed into a college in 1973 today counts 18 member states; Benin Republic, Burkina-Faso, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Liberia, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo, Gabon, RDC, and Guinée Bissau.

By Ndi Eugene Ndi (Eden Newspaper)