Everyday in the news I come across numbers that just blow my mind. This time it is malaria. Leadership Newspaper quoted the registrar, Environmental Health Officers Registration Council of Nigeria (EHORECON), Augustine Ebisike, who claimed he got his figures as follows.
According to the registrar, at least one person treats malaria three times in a year at the average cost of N3, 000, adding that if such amount is multiplied by 170 million people the bill is on the high side.
Despite the crude way the figure was calculated, it still adds up to N1.5trillion. Just how can someone in government quote such a wild figure for something as important as malaria. Maybe the news source is to blame.