But after a serious meditation and research, and having listened and read the views of numerous theologians, philosophers, psychologists, archeologists, naturalists, and the like, I have come to the curious conclusion that it is very wrong to attribute every death to the will of God. Certainly, there are some deaths that are avoidable – caused by our negligence, our omission, or our commission. What do you think would ultimately happen to a person who chooses to commit suicide or smokes or drinks profusely? Naturally he will die. Then, would it be proper to attribute his death to God?
In any case, the focus of this piece is not to discuss the mysterious issue of life and death, because it is a subject that requires a very critical appraisal of some existential issues – which are, often, hidden from the knowledge of an ‘ordinary’ mind. What I intend to prove by this article is that low life expectancy among Nigerians is caused by ourselves, not God. The truth is that God has made us in His image and likeness and given us our will and wisdom, which He did not give to animals, to manage our affairs to the benefit of one another and to the glory of His Holy Name.
But, what has man done on the contrary? He has chosen the path of infamy and perdition by his inquisitiveness, overzealousness, excesses, mischief, greed and wickedness. It was man’s greed and insatiability that caused the first man – Adam – to fall flat in the face of temptation by Eve. From that moment death set in. Even at that, many people still led long and fruitful lives. For instance – Methuselah – the oldest man that ever lived – died at the ripe age of 969 years. Numerous others at his time lived for as many as 600, 400, and 500 years. In fact, there is a portion of the Bible (somewhere in the Book of Genesis) where God set the limit to the number of years anybody would live on earth at 120 years. The drastic cut in the number of years assigned to man on earth was due to sin, especially the sin of homosexuality. Remember Sodom and Gomorrah? The city was destroyed as a result of bestiality and homosexuality among the inhabitants of the city. According to the Scriptures, only Lot and his Family were spared. The rest perished.
However, as sin continued to overtake the world, life expectancy has continued to nosedive. It now hovers between 48 and 115 years – depending on where you live on earth. In Japan, and Asia generally, life expectancy is very high. It ranges between 70 and 80 for men and 75 and 85 years for women. In the United States, Europe and Australia the figure dilates between 70 and 100 years.
Last week, I watched a news item on the CNN about the ill-health of Prince Phillip (husband of Queen Elizabeth II). According to Cable News Network (CNN), Prince Phillip went to hospital himself for an exploratory surgery that would see him stay in hospital for just two weeks. Incredibly, the Prince was not assisted by anybody into his hospital room. Instead, he walked into the ward by himself – at the age of 92 years. This kind of stoical disposition can only be exhibited by a man who has led a very good and quality life. In our clime, a 92-year-old man would probably have been out of circulation by now.
There had been cases of celebrities and retired sportsmen and women in Europe and America who died at ripe, old age. I always read some local and national newspapers in the United States and I am, each time, attracted to their obituary pages. 80 per cent of the dead, whose obsequies are published, have their ages range from 70 to 90 years. Compare that to a normal newspaper in Nigeria and you baffle at the figures you get. Some die at scandalous ages ranging from 35 to 48 years.
I read one obituary in a national newspaper in Nigeria last week and was moved to tears, forcing me to write this piece. This young man – the son of a very prominent Nigerian businesswoman – died at the age of 25 years in an accident, leaving his parents to mourn him, after they had spent fortunes training him in universities abroad. It took him returning to Nigeria, after his sojourn abroad, to die. There are cases like that all the time. Sadly, nobody has spared a thought to ask why this is happening and what can be done to stop or reduce it.
The stark reality is that many of our able-bodied youth die daily from unnatural causes that include frustration, joblessness, accidents, stress, poor lifestyles and eating habits, and dirtiness. Out of these causes dirtiness and poor lifestyles are the chief culprits. They kill between one and one and half million Nigerians annually.
Take it or leave it: low life expectancy among Nigerians is caused mainly by our poor lifestyles, dirty habits and the dirty environments under which many of our people live. To worsen the already bad situation, government has not helped matters either. It is true that some of our leaders lack the character to govern decently. They are interested more in what they can get for themselves and their families and generations yet unborn, leaving other people to die of hunger, diseases, and ignorance.
Wait for this: Nigerians are naturally very dirty people. Check this out: they dump refuse indiscriminately in gutters and the backyards and frontages of their homes. Those who have nowhere to dump the refuse live with them in their homes, thereby exposing themselves to diseases. What about sewage disposal? This poses a very serious danger to human survival. Human wastes are disposed in such a callous manner that many of our people live at their mercy. Sewage is dumped in sources of water supply for human consumption or on roads. And it seems everybody is helpless.
Dirty habits among Nigerians account for the majority of deaths we record annually. Do not forget that these dirty habits breed deadly viruses and bacteria that attack humans and lead to grave consequences. What do you expect when a person visits the toilet and returns, without washing his hands bounces on a bowl of amala or eba or tuwo? This is a common habit among many Nigerians, particularly the poor.
Worst still, there are some Nigerians that wear expensive apparels without taking their bath in the past 24 hours. What those who live in dirty environments or engage in dirty habits fail to appreciate is the harm they cause themselves. They are vulnerable to diseases that cause deaths ultimately.
Have you observed very closely the lifestyles or eating habits of some Nigerians? They consume junk in the name of food and drink excessively – all in the name of living high or big. Those that drink or smoke excessively do it unconscionably. The consequences are usually dire for the drinker and smoker and those around him: rising cases of diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, liver cirrhoses, and other terminal diseases, resulting in sudden deaths.
Some of our hospitals are mere prescription centres. They lack basic equipment and drugs required of such medical centres. Money budgeted annually is either misappropriated or embezzled outright. This leaves many of the citizenry without affordable healthcare. While the poor and voiceless suffer and die in silence from the diseases that afflict them, the rich and powerful find their way to notable hospitals in Europe, India, the United States and, even, Ghana, in search of medical attention. The money rich Nigerians spend seeking medical services abroad every year will be enough to erect centres of excellence in medicine across the country.
Ignorance is another cause of short life expectancy in Nigeria. Many Nigerians are ignorant of their health status. Some of them suffer from all kinds of diseases without knowing it. From available statistics over 20 per cent of Nigerians suffer from hypertension (High Blood Pressure). A few suffer from low blood pressure too. Each is a silent killer. Hypertension occurs when a person’s blood pressure rises beyond a tolerable level. Usually, a person who has a blood pressure reading of over 140/90 is said to suffer from hypertension. It is painful that when some Nigerians die from hypertension or similar heart conditions it is often erroneously attributed to witches and wizards. This belief is very common among those that live in the rural areas, particularly where medical personnel are not available.
HIV/AIDS is another killer. A recent statistics show that about 3.2milion Nigerians are infected and those in the lower age brackets are most affected. The implication of this is that unless something drastic is done the figure will continue to rise, until it reaches an irredeemable level.
What of maternal/infant mortality? The figure has continued to rise in geometric proportion. The culprits here are malaria, measles, whooping cough, diphtheria, rickety, polio, diarrhoea, and jaundice. Nonetheless, it is very sad that these diseases, despite the fact they are preventable, are still allowed to consume innocent lives. What are our governments doing that they should allow this trend to continue in the face of the billions that are generated annually from duties on imports and exports and mineral resources? Governments alone cannot be blamed here. Parents have a share of the blame, as many mothers do not take their children for immunization when due. Interestingly, and through the intervention of donor agencies and government’s sustained campaign, cases of polio and other communicable disease have considerably been reduced.
Accident is another mass-killer. Because many of our mobile youth population are always on the go they are usually most affected by vehicular accidents. Hundreds of them die annually from these avoidable accidents that are caused by human faults (over-speeding and poorly maintained vehicles) and bad roads. Nigeria’s roads are among the worst in sub-Saharan Africa. Last year alone, Nigeria lost over 300,000 innocent lives to road accidents. Some of these accidents are heart-rending and cause monumental loss of human lives. There was a particular accident that occurred early this year along the Lagos/Ibadan Expressway – in which over 40 lives were lost. About 30 of the victims, who died on the spot, were young boys and girls – not above 30 years. What of the accident that occurred sometime last year before Christmas involving some NYSC members along Kaduna-Zaria Road? 12 of them died on the spot when the Toyota Hiace bus in which they were travelling after it collided with a parked trailer. The list is endless.
Joblessness has also driven many young Nigerians to crime. Unfortunately, many of them have either ended up in long jail terms or death as a result. What is government doing about employment for millions of our youth that roam the streets, finding solace in crimes and other social misdemeanours? It is the responsibility of government to provide jobs for these youths. And we have the capacity as a nation to actualize this objective. Nevertheless, some unconscionable leaders have turned their eyes away from these suffering youths and are quick to blame them whenever they engage in any illegality or misconduct. Probably, our leaders have glossed over the sufferings of the people, especially the youth, not mindful of the dangers to which this exposes them (the leaders and the rich). Do we not know that the best way to eliminate the social ills that plague our society is through the provision of jobs for the youth, from whom a large army of robbers, cultists, rapists, assassins, kidnappers is turned out?
Now let me ask: Is it the will of God we should die young? The answer is capital ‘No.’ God desires not even the death of anybody, which was why He sent His only son to die for the redemption of our sins. Psalm 90:10 captures this succinctly when it says: “Seventy years is all you have, 80 years if you are strong, yet all they bring you is trouble and sorrow. Life is soon over and you are gone.” Elijah also brought the son of the widow of Nain back to life, while Christ raised the dead son of another widow back to life. From these instances, it is very clear that God wants us to live a long, fruitful and meaningful life devoted to his worship and service of humanity.
What do we have today? The young, the old, the sick, the healthy, the rich, the poor all die like fowls in Nigeria. Some die without showing any signs of sickness or discomfort, making death one of the cheapest ‘commodities’ in Nigeria.
Should this sad chapter in our national life be allowed to persist by government? That will be tragic. Everything points to the need to arrest the trend and build sustainable structures for the development and enhancement of the well-being of the people, particularly the youth whose future has been constantly imperiled.
Another thing government should actually do is to intensify efforts aimed at reversing any negative trend that inhibits growth and development. This is where focus should shift to the development of social infrastructure to make life worth living and reduce stress and sudden deaths among the people. Provision of steady electricity will do the magic. In fact, no development of substance can take place without steady power. We need electricity to drive the economy and power the equipment that provides comfort for the people.
Hunger and malnutrition is twin-enemy to the healthy development of the human person. The number of those who are hungry (especially children) in our country outstrips the number that can afford to feed themselves. This is a sign of a nation in distress. We need to engage in serious mechanized agriculture to make food available to the majority of the people and reduce the high incidence of death from hunger and malnutrition.
Parents should teach their children how to lead clean and God-fearing life, devoid of hate and rancour. A chaotic and disorganised life is an invitation to sudden death.
Again, the law on smoking (they can also add a law on drinking of alcoholic beverages) should be made stiffer to deter Nigerians from engaging in excessive smoking in order to reduce the number of people that die annually from lung and liver diseases.
Above all, there is an urgent need for Nigerians to change their attitude towards the environment. Personal hygiene is central to the development of a sound and functional mind. Government should reintroduce Sanitary Inspectors to help in maintaining clean environment and check its abuse. Before then, government should enact laws to make it punishable for any Nigerian to abuse the environment.
Let it be told today: Nigerians die young out of their own fault, the wickedness of their leaders, and unseen and often self-inflicted factors that complicate their lives and expose them to cheap deaths. We should stop blaming witches and wizards for any misfortune that befalls us when God in His infinite mercy has created us to know Him, love Him, worship Him and live with Him in the life after.
A little care and diligence will, definitely, do.
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