Nigerians And The Blood of Jesus -By Loretta Oduware Ogboro-Okor

Blood of Jesus…!!!

Rings in my ears and in my mind always. Many thanks to my mother who made this her catch phrase for anything that evokes her anxiety, pain, sadness, joy, and any other emotion sprinkled in between any of these primary ones. Furthermore, my strong Christian faith which I practise with no apologies at all, simply means I am no stranger to the Blood of Jesus. I know that my many friends and people of other faith aside Christianity, whom I respect their choice, must also have their equivalent for the Blood of Jesus.

However, in my recent local primary healthcare outreach in Edo State, our data trend has revealed how Blood of Jesus is the echolalia of our population. Echolalia can be defined as spontaneous and most times unsolicited repetition of vocalisations made by another person often times in an automatic and effortless way – auto pilot repetition is what I liken it to. My dear readers, many thanks for those who contacted me, asking why there has been a hiatus in the regular release of my opinion pieces. Well, this silence has been due to this same grassroot work in my home state of Edo, in Nigeria, intensifying the over a decade old humanitarian effort of my husband and I. Loretta Health Initiative (LHI) branch of our work has been in all the senatorial districts of Edo State, our nooks and crannies, taking basic primary healthcare to the lowest of the low in our society, with the aid of our team of selfless volunteers.

Blood of Jesus is key… oh yes! As Christians, we are in our right to believe and pray. However, the qualitative analytics from our healthcare outreach data where we see an average of 356 persons at each location shows some disturbing trends. At the fore is late presentation or late healthcare seeking behaviour which has Blood of Jesus emerging as a major causative factor from the root cause analysis. I will give us some examples – from the field so we can understand. Team Loretta Health Initiative (LHI) saw two of our sisters. One from Edo North and the other from Edo South Senatorial districts with similar clinical histories. Our sisters, 3 and 4 years ago respectively, saw tiny swellings in their breasts. In fact, for the one from Edo North, it was her husband that first detected the lump. Both women were advised to go and see a nurse or doctor. In both cases, the lumps were painless and of no consequence at the time. So, my dearest sisters pleaded the Blood of Jesus. They went to church; they prayed daily, and they forgot about the lump. Now, 3 and 4 years later when Team LHI saw them, they have full blown breast cancer. The similar narrative of these ladies is scary for me. Sad to say the one from Edo South died last month.

Our brother John from Edo Central is another case of Blood of Jesus applied wrongly. He told us that he had been passing urine in a start-stop manner. He said he too prayed daily and pleaded the Blood of Jesus that his flow of urine becomes normal. By the time we saw him in the LHI village outreach, he was passing Blood… his own, not that of Jesus, in his urine. An examination by one of team LHI volunteer doctors revealed his prostate gland was hard, irregular, and most likely cancerous. We referred him urgently to the closest tertiary hospital in Edo Central. Follow-up has since confirmed our suspicion. He had successful surgery and has since been discharged with follow-up and a better quality of life.

On this journey, we have seen persons with ridiculously high blood pressure that defy what medical science says about the basic principles of the physiology of being alive. Once, we saw figures as high as 280/180 mmHg in a long-distance vehicle driver who said he was just passing by, heard about the programme, and decided to walk in. We had to explain to him that he needed to take medications as an emergency to get the blood pressure down. That it was unsafe for himself and other road users to allow him get behind the wheels on that day. He could have a stroke as he was driving. Luckily, he listened. We had to put him on regular medications after the initial two start doses, we administered to lower the blood pressure quickly and also organise follow up for him. Our data show that about 40 percent of the hypertensive patients we see tell us they never knew they were hypertensive. Out of the other 60 percent who know that they have hypertension, a significant 60 percent stop taking their medications after a while. We found that of this 60 percent, that stop taking their medications, a quarter is because they have no money, another quarter did not just understand that it is life-long management and half of them have the belief they have been healed by the Blood of Jesus. Let me simplify all these percentages to simple figures. Imagine we see 10 hypertensive patients, 4 tell us they are not known to have hypertension from before. Six of them admit to knowing they have hypertension. Then, of these 6, about 4 stop taking their medications, and all forms of follow-up, despite knowing they have raised blood pressure. From these 4 people, 1 stopped because of lack of funds, another 1 stopped because they just did not understand that it should be managed for life. While 2 stopped because they have been healed by the Blood of Jesus yet, the sphygmomanometer that is the Blood Pressure measurement apparatus, tells us otherwise.

My dear Edo State people and by extension, my fellow Nigerians, God is the one that has given healthcare providers knowledge to help us. We should keep faith, we pray, the healthcare providers treat, and God heals. From these real-life examples and the data from our LHI field experience, it is palpably evident that we should not use our “religiosity” to kill ourselves. Blood of Jesus is available to all people… but good healthcare and proper healthcare seeking habits is also needed. My dear people, let us not hide any problems we may have behind socio-cultural cloaks, secrecy, or fanatical religious beliefs. We will not all be unwell at the same time, but we can all become unwell at one time or the other. No one is too pretty, handsome, too rich or too poor not to fall sick one day. Our health is our responsibility. God wants us to take this responsibility seriously. Making healthy choices, living in moderation, deliberately seeking out healthcare awareness information, intentionally meditating about our health and our healing is way more productive than the echolalia that is the Blood of Jesus.

On the flip side, healthcare system policies that promote value for human lives and the attendant infrastructure as well as required human capacity for healthcare needs to be provided by the government of the day at all levels – Local, State and Federal Government. The percentage of our budget dedicated for healthcare currently in Nigeria leaves a sour taste in the mouth and a hole in the heart even though it was in Abuja, in 2001, that African Union member states signed the declaration that at least 15 percent of their annual budgets will be used to improve healthcare. It is when the proper systems are missing that the people will turn to pleading the Blood of Jesus and even copiously fetching it. Compare us to resource rich nations – how many times do an average 150 women die daily from pregnancy and pregnancy related causes in the United States, United Kingdom, Singapore or even in Rwanda and South Africa as it is the case in Nigeria, reported by World Health Organisation?

The word of Jesus says we must love our neighbour as our selves. When we love our neighbours as ourselves, our policymaking politicians will act on the 15 percent for healthcare development as agreed by the 2001 Abuja Declaration. When we abide by the word of Jesus, we will understand how prevention is cheaper and wiser than cure. True faith and practice of any religion means our leaders will push the boundaries of value for Nigerian lives and invest in the Sustainable Development Goals.

Following the aftermath of Nigeria’s 2023 Presidential elections and all the ensuing imbroglio and now, with the world engaged in two needless wars; one that continues to drag on in Ukraine and another tearing through the middle East, the world geo-politico-economic order is as unpredictable as ever. Is it not time for us to focus, as Nigerians on balancing the word of Jesus with the blood of Jesus? From individuals, to families, communities, faith-based organisations, judiciary, traditional institutions, policy makers and government at all levels? It is time we remember that the “Nigerian Patients are Worth It and that any one of us can become a patient at any time”. Ladies and gentlemen, I posit that as a people, we must move to stop the echolalia that is the Blood of Jesus, and its equivalent in any of our different faiths. We should strive to practise the true words inherent in our parallel faiths instead. That my people, is where all faiths of all peoples, intersect.

Dr Loretta Oduware Ogboro-Okor is author of the book, My Father’s Daughter