Colonial Health Management in Idoma Division, 1908-1960

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine colonial health management in Idoma Division during the period 1908-1960. The main thrust of the paper is predicated on the premise that; health is one of the important social indicators the colonial state attempted to institutionalized because of the earlier experiences they had in other colonies of the world. It should be noted that explorers such as Henrich Barth, Clerperton, Richard Lander and several others, reported to the colonial government in London, the danger of malaria in the hinterland of Nigeria, this gave them (the colonialists) the zeal to manufacture quinine, the drugs used to cure malaria in the first half of the 19th century. In Idoma Division, some district officers such as Capt. Money, Maj. Maggerson and others, developed local dispensaries under the Otukpo Native Authority and Igumale respectively. These dispensaries were not advanced to cater for all the colonized people. Diseases such as leprosy was considered as more serious as such, the colonial state established the leprosy camps in Otukpo and other Districts in Idoma Division. Taken together, therefore, the paper is an attempt to unravel the colonial health management and to demonstrate clearly how this affected our indigenous medical practices up to 1960. Nigerian became a dependent state to the British for orthodox medicine and the likes. In order to reconstruct the history of health management in Idoma Division effectively, the paper employs historical methodology in the process. This includes the collection and the interpretation of primary data from the archives as well as conduct of oral interview which was also supplemented with secondary sources.