Our vision has always been bold: to create a network of health solutions that are not only accessible and affordable but also world class. We will continue to empower individuals to live healthier and fuller lives and restore hope in Africa’s healthcare system. This is because, to achieve a developed Africa, we must have healthier Africans
Emmanuel Ukudolo I Thursday, April 17, 2025
SURULERE, Lagos, Nigeria – Avon Medical, an Heirs Holdings company has set up a 50-bed ultra modern medical facility in Surulere, Lagos to cater for everyone in need of medical intervention to save life.
The facility which was inaugurated by the Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, in the presence of Chairman Heirs Holdings, Mr. Tony Elumelu CFR, his wife, Dr. Awele Elumelu, Chairperson, Avon Medical Practice, and Commissioner for Health, Lagos State, Professor Emmanuel Akinola Abayomi and other eminent personalities and medical professionals is equipped with the state-of-the-art facilities in medical intervention with qualified practitioners.
The 50-bed facility has full diagnostics, obstetrics and gynecology, paediatrics, neonatal and other area of specialised medical care. For Avon Medical, the journey did not just start today but some sixteen years ago.
“In 2009 a decision was made to make a world class healthcare facility accessible and affordable for all. Not just for the wealthy, and the privileged few but for everyone”, Dr. Awele Elumelu, Chairperson, Avon Medical Practice told the gathering during the inauguration in Lagos, putting into consideration the poor state of healthcare facility in the country, lack of modern equipment, with medical professionals stretched to their limits and too many people frustrated due to inability to access medical help when needed and on time.
More worrisome for her is the fact that Africa carries over 20% of the global disease burden yet has access to only 1 percent of healthcare resources, with approximately 48 percent of Africans not having access to the quality of healthcare they need.
As she puts it, only about 3 percent of global health workers serve the African continent. She continued, “In Nigeria alone, the gap is in the number of available and qualified medical doctors, beds, and equipment, which shows a system under pressure” adding that the berthing of Avon Medical reflects the philosophy, of the Heirs Holdings, Africapitalism.
She explained that though African healthcare system is the hardest hit by the migration crisis, the private sector, she believes has a major role to play in the continent’s development and the responsibility, not just to generate profit but most importantly to create a lasting impact, to do well and do good, to solve problems and to improve lives that will transform Africa. For her, the inauguration of the Avon Medical is nothing but just a springboard.
“Our vision has always been bold: to create a network of health solutions that are not only accessible and affordable but also world class. We will continue to empower individuals to live healthier and fuller lives and restore hope in Africa’s healthcare system. This is because, to achieve a developed Africa, we must have healthier Africans.
In other to achieve these milestones, she had to set up Avon Medical and a health insurance company, Avon HMO in the first place. “From our humble beginnings of operating just a work-site-clinic at a single location, we have grown into a 50 bed hospital network, including a dialysis centre and several worksite clinics”, Dr. Awele announced.
In his address, the Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu noted that as told by Dr. Awele, Avon Medical did not just give up after one little clinic or one small hospital.
“They wanted to make an impact. They wanted to indeed make a full print of what vision they saw, what issues they will have in a critical sector like health. And Avon Medical, I would dare say, has put their name in the sand of time in this industry, not only in Lagos, but in Nigeria.
“And so, for us, it is to use them as a platform to encourage others”, the governor said, noting that health practitioners, health institutions, health facilities everywhere in the world are not done by one arm of a society alone.
“Governments can certainly not provide everything for everyone. But the government must create that enabling environment for private equity, for private partners, for private investors to take that decision and put their investment into the health profession. It’s not the easiest sector to put money into. It’s not the easiest sector that you think you’ll make a turnaround in 12 months or in 24 months. You must have what we call patient investment”, Sanwo-Olu said.
The governor who said he has to put the weekly Lagos State Executive Council Meeting on hold for hours to attend the event added: “You must have patient investors that will know that they are solving humankind’s problem. And so, it’s not an investment where you hope to make a return in 6 months or 18 months, and you are wondering what has happened. No.
“If you’re in the health sector, you must be in it for a very long time. But more importantly, you must have the conscience and the sense of purpose to say that I want to indeed help my citizens, help my people, help our society to have a better health outcome at the end of the day.
“And so, I feel truly proud of what Avon Medical has done, what you’ve been doing in the past 16 years. We know that you started as a small clinic. You went into the health insurance scheme. But now you have grown to a full diagnostic, O&G, paediatric health facility”, he said, stressing “for you in one location to build a 50-bed, full diagnostics, obstetrics and gynae, full paediatrics, neonatal and the rest of it, means that there are several levels of specialties that have been brought together.
“And I can see that specialty also being reflected here by one of our comperes, who is a medical practitioner who stands here to also be able to deliver. And so, for us, it’s really to thank you, to encourage you, to say that we’re watching, and we want to assure you that we’ll continue to create an enabling environment for you to work and to encourage others that want to also participate”, he said.
The governor noted that there is the need to reverse the trend of medical personnel seeking greener pastures outside the shores of Nigeria.
But how? “And how to reverse it, is the kind of facility here that we’re handing over. And it’s the kind of other facilities both at the state and the national levels that we’re all striving to do. For us as a government in the last six years, not only were we able to solve seemingly difficult problems during COVID, which everybody talked about, but it has given us that challenge to say that never again will we allow other people, other nations, other continents to come and tell us—in the event of a global pandemic—how to be”, the governor said, using the occasion to enumerate his achievements so far in the health sector.
