INTRODUCTION

Each time the media space is choked with stories of how African young, educated, highly skilled professionals, are leaving the continent in droves, in search of developed nations where they do not need to know anyone, their skin color notwithstanding, to fulfill their lifelong ambitions of acquiring the necessary exposure and certifications, with which to contribute to the development of the planet.

There is often this spirit of sadness and gloom that overwhelms me, especially when I face the reality, that there obviously seems to be, no hope in sight for the development of this nation and the reasons are very glaring; the Nigerian people are largely more of a conquered population who derive extreme fulfilment from being divided along ethnic, religious and tribal lines, than a people who can rally together, with the sole aim of holding the political class accountable, for them to do what would be in the interest of the masses.

For a country like Nigeria where the health care industry contributed a paltry <4% to the nations GDP, for the past 5 years.

A country where approximately five thousand (5000) Medical Doctors leave the country per month which aggregates to sixty thousand (60,000) medical Doctors leaving in a year, for more advanced nations where they can practice their profession with relative ease and available critical infrastructure.

For a nation that loses Two (2) billion USD annually, to outbound healthcare tourism, it is more frightening to realize that the figure lost to other nations on healthcare tourism annually from Nigeria, is bigger than the nation’s total healthcare budget for the year 2022.

Then you should understand why all hands must be on deck to do what we can to make the nation and continent’s healthcare sector better which includes, travelling out of the continent to technologically and infrastructurally advanced nations, to carry out solution specific academic research, with which they can improve our healthcare sector in Africa if implemented.

Knowing that a paltry 5.75% of our annual budget in Nigeria is committed to the healthcare sector while nations like United States of America are devoting as much as 22% of their annual budget to the health sector, it is now understandable why young, innovative minds must go the extra mile to innovate and build systems that can help them offer better healthcare services to the citizens of their nations and continent at large at relatively affordable cost.

For a continent that shoulders 25% of the global disease burden, while providing just 1% of the global financing for health care, it is a smart move for anyone to innovate and build healthcare products that are affordable to help these African nations fare better with respect to the quality of healthcare services they offer to their citizens.

EARLY DAYS

Sometime in the late eighties, a certain Obingwa born member of the Nigerian academia – a Lecturer and his wife who is a Nurse, had given birth to their second ebony complexioned son, somewhere in Eastern Nigeria, Western Africa.

This baby at the time was christened, Ezeama, Chidi Elvis. Being that his Father later rose to become a Professor of Microbiology, while his mother practiced her course of study, which is Nursing Sciences, it would be wrong for anyone to argue when we assert, that this young man was raised by parents, who were of the middle class in the society at the time and as such, could be said to have lived a fairly comfortable life, the size of their family notwithstanding.

The relatively comfortable status of the family did not prevent Ezeama Chidi Elvis from growing up into an ambitious adult, who has never settled for anything less.

Mr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis, had earlier found his way to Adventist Secondary Technical College, (ASTEC) Owerrinta, Abia State ahead of me, where we both had our Secondary school education. He had spent some years in ASTEC before our likes, arrived sometime later in the year 2000 to join them. In principle, I am ordinarily supposed to address him as “Senior Ezeama Chidi Elvis”.

ASTEC was an exceptional blessing to so many of us who graduated from there, as it was a mixed sex, full boarding only option, Secondary school where we were groomed extensively into the men and women we have finally become.

We imbibed both the hard and soft skills, with which to live our lives from our then teachers at ASTEC, who often epitomized, most of the values they impacted us with, in their own daily lives. Those trainings have consistently helped us extensively through the journey of life even uptil this day.

Back at ASTEC, there was one special ability that Mr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis was remarkable for, it was his ability to walk extremely fast as he always seemed to be in a haste to somewhere at all times.

INSTITUTION OF HIGHER LEARNING; THE JOURNEY FROM BEING A MICROBIOLOGIST TO A MEDICAL DOCTOR

The year 2004 was the last time I set my eyes on Mr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis till sometime in the year 2009, when I met him briefly at Nnamdi Azikiwe University where he was studying Applied Microbiology at the time, although this was never part of the initial study / academic plans, he had for himself, as he was innately disposed to being an Engineer, more than any other thing.

Owing to the reality that we were born and live in the “poverty capital” of the world being Nigeria, most parents do not ever make the mistake of allowing their hitherto smart kids, study any course that does not guarantee a secure financial future.

The above explanation could be adduced as one of the reasons, Prof. Ezeama insisted that his second son had only a choice, which was for the “young restless son” of his, to study Medicine and Surgery.

The dedication to serve humanity through his medical practice, which is an integral part of practicing Medicine and Surgery world over, if I am asked, was a part of the profession, which Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis later identified for himself on his journey through life as a Medical Doctor, as that might have not been the primary objective at the time of seeking admission to study the course.

There are a lot of realities we face in Nigeria that are quite amazing, one of such, is the fact that, certain courses of study are the exclusive preserve of the rich, the influential in the society which includes top ranking lecturers or a few extremely intelligent or gifted kids, to study.

These category of people in the society, as stated earlier in the above paragraph have what can be called, the right of first refusal, to study such “premium courses”, just the same way it is being alleged, that France has, over the mining right of some highly priced minerals in some Francophone countries in Africa which were once their colonies.

The other alternative for the wealthy and influential in the society is for their wards in their quest to study Medicine and Surgery, to find their way to tangibly expensive, privately owned Universities around the nation where they could make their dreams a reality.

It would be right to say that owing to the privilege of being the son, of a widely published Nigerian professor of Microbiology, just as it is evident on ResearchGate.com, one of the websites where scholarly articles are published, coupled with the fact that this son in question, was eminently qualified by the reality of his examination scores, to study Medicine and Surgery, it was not a surprise to our likes, that the State owned University, called Abia State University Medical School, Uturu found Mr. Ezeama, Chidi Elvis worthy of being offered such a highly priced admission.

On graduating from the Department of Applied Microbiology in Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka Anambra State, he enrolled to study Medicine and Surgery at Abia State University after passing his examinations.

Being an overly focused and determined young man, he pursued the ambition of him becoming a Medical Doctor, with a laser beam focus and commitment to excellence, even as he honed his skills at his other talents, along the path of his study.

The journey finally came to an exciting end with Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis, acquiring an MBBS as an addition to his already acquired B.Sc degree.

While all these was happening, it never occurred to Dr. Ezeama, Chidi Elvis that these were all God, being an all-knowing being, orchestrating all of these events, to make it possible for him to function in a unique niche, which He was going to launch the young chap into, in the future.

We have it on good authority that assuming Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis had a way to fill in Engineering and Medicine as his first choice and second choice courses respectively, during the period he sought admission into the University, he would have effectively done that, but such was not possible, as both courses are highly priced courses that cannot be “subservient” to each other, in the Nigerian context, as they are both kings in their various worlds.

Upon Dr. Ezeama, Chidi Elvis graduation from Medical School, he spent some time with Federal Medical Centre Umuahia where he came in direct contact with the stark reality of the many landmines laced along the path of practicing Medicine in Nigeria.

During this his short stint with what we can call a tertiary healthcare facility in South Eastern Nigeria, he lost count of the number of times he attended to patients who could not in any way, afford the cost of the investigations that they had been asked to do, with which they were to be diagnosed and treated, as the healthcare service payment in Nigeria, is largely out of pocket while the population is largely poor.

The trauma of losing patients whom you are eminently skilled to handle but who you cannot help, because of the lack of the availability of the equipment with which you were supposed to work with, and the inability of these patients to pay for basic investigations, dealt with his mental health the most.

During this period of his medical practice in Nigeria, he paid medical bills for some patients of his, but there was always a limit to which he could assist, owing to resource constraint, as there were so many patients who could not afford their basic medical bills and who did not also have any form of medical insurance.

There were some very ugly experiences that spiked his interest, to go back to his first love; – Engineering once again. There was a time, in a medical facility where Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis worked in, had its centrifuge in the Medical Laboratory, break down and this implied that the Laboratory stopped carrying out any investigation procedure, that would require any form of separation of plasma and serum from the whole blood cells.

This went on for months before finally, it was fixed, with the hospital loosing so much revenue during that period the equipment downtime lasted and also it stretched unjustifiably, the effective time required to attend to the patients.

The second event that he can remember that made him take a firm decision of “no retreat no surrender” on his ambition to get an Engineering qualification, was a time when the C – arm used for delicate surgeries in the hospital broke down.

The company that produced the equipment was contacted and they had to send in their Engineers from overseas, to come down to Umuahia, Abia State South Eastern Nigeria to fix the equipment, which took a lot of time.

Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis being an interested party during the repair process with the Biomedical Engineers, observed that what was replaced was something as “common” as a fuse.

This was when he decided that owing to the many problems we face in Africa as resource poor nations, which is outrightly not justifiable in its real sense, that he was going to take a detour from Medical Sciences to pursue a career in Biomedical Engineering as his own way of contributing to the development of the continent.

The thought of taking a detour from the practice of Medicine to pursue an unbelievable career path in Biomedical Engineering, sounds so good and ambitious to a storyteller, but it entirely means a different thing, to the individual, whom it is his sole responsibility to birth to life, such a dream. It is obviously not a journey for the faint hearted.

This noble ambition of Dr. Ezeama, Chidi Elvis was only going to be classified as an ambition, only good for the papers, skit makers, podcasts hosts and story tellers, until live comes into it which could only happen, when the Australian University, offers him the much sought after, Master’s degree admission to study Biomedical Engineering, despite his background in Medicine and Surgery.

The journey to securing this admission with an Australian University was outrightly herculean, tough, unconventional and long. Infact, during his period of many rejections and reapplying for him to be considered nonetheless, the validity of his first IETLS elapsed such that he had to write the examination the second time.

While all these were concurrently going on, Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis was running a music record label called ei records.

SECURING A HIGHLY PRICED ADMISSION WITH FLINDERS UNIVERSITY, ADELAIDE SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

The reality of most Nigerian youths with lofty ambitions to acquire exposures and certifications, with which they can contribute to the development of the nation and the continent at large, who unfortunately are not the children of the filthy rich or politically powerful, is that the system here in most cases frustrate such ambitions to a halt.

Hence most daring youths, who are obsessed with their quest to be better with respect to their academic qualifications and cognate skills, with which to pursue their life ambitions, often sacrifice everything they have, in most cases to raise the resources with which they eventually travel out of the country/continent, to acquire these qualifications. In Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis’ case, he had to part with so much of his earlier acquired assets, just as the family also did their part to support him and his ambition at the time.

This here explains why a young promising professional like Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis would persist with his series of applications to Australian Universities to be given the opportunity to fulfil a lifelong ambition of Researching on landmark projects that would birth innovative solutions to some of our African challenges, despite his applications being rejected severally.

He finally found favor with world-renowned, top-ranking Flinders University, Adelaide South Australia.

“Flinders University has developed a remarkable record of achievement across an impressive range of endeavor.

Through the diverse efforts of an eclectic cohort of teachers, researchers and graduates, Flinders has exerted a profound and distinctive influence on society and in its various communities.

Just as our namesake Matthew Flinders famously remarked, he was not content to rest unnoticed in the middle order, Flinders as an institution has never been content with the status quo; we have always looked for ways to make the world a better place by making a positive difference”.

For an institution with such a vision as this, “To be internationally recognized as a world leader in research, an innovator in contemporary education, and the source of Australia’s most enterprising graduates” you would not be shocked to know that the Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis, persisted against all odds, secured the highly priced admission and graduated from his Master’s programme from this institution, as an inventor with so many laurels to his name for an exceptional innovation aimed at revolutionizing how Malaria is diagnosed in the world.

Flinders University, Adelaide South Australia was established in the year 1966 and named after a British Navigator Mathew Flinders who explored and surveyed the Australian and South Australian coastline in the 19^th century. This university interestingly, is a member of the Innovative Universities Research Group.

Owing to the fact that Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis had a Medical undergraduate background, securing a Masters admission to study Biomedical Engineering as a post graduate programme at Flinders University South Australia was as difficult, as getting the Nigerian government to explore the crude oil in the Niger Delta for the sole aim of the development of the Nigerian State exclusively.

A silver lining of hope appeared on his aspirational skyline, the day he saw an admission pathway advert which factored in applicants who were never originally graduates from Engineering Department. He explored this option, came to his application with his “A” game, showing his accessors that despite not being an Engineer, that he had preliminary knowledge of Engineering and was willing to put in the work to achieve his goal.

Moreso before then, he took some further steps by creating an album on his Facebook handle, where he published an Intellijib camera project on the 19th of April, 2018 just to show how much of technical skills he had developed.

After a rigorous application screening exercise, Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis was offered an admission to study Biomedical Engineering Science, which if he was able to ace his grades after the session with a C (70) score, he would then be admitted fully to study Biomedical Engineering, else he would have to leave to study other familiar courses like Masters in Nursing or Public Health.

At the end of the course, Dr. Ezeama, Chidi Elvis had excellent grades which enabled him to pursue his dream course of Biomedical Engineering proper. The passion he had for the ambition was worth so much, hence he gave it his best shot and it paid off.

THE “DR. EZEAMA CHIDI ELVIS MOMENT” IN CLASS AT FLINDERS UNIVERSITY AUSTRALIA.

For a Medical Doctor who was attending to patients a few weeks earlier in Nigeria Western Africa, prior to his arrival at Australia few weeks later, where he had come to birth a dream of a lifetime, it is relatable when you are told that Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis, the Medical Doctor who was on his way to becoming an Engineer became famous, in a class filled with Engineers for his boldness at asking questions about topics that he did not understand so well, his skin complexion notwithstanding.

Moreso, it is necessary that I make a brief mention of how the Obingwa Abia State born Nigerian Medical Doctor cried when he got to Flinders University to see the quality of infrastructure they had on campus for their studies, which they all as students, had equal rights to access whenever they needed to do so.

He had to call to mind how unfortunate the Nigerian scholar is when compared to their Colleagues in developed nations like Australia.

Having Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis raise his hands up, after every (dy/dx) class session, became what every member of the class had to get used to. That moment that the fearless and very bold Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis always stood up to perform his trademark ritual of asking questions after every lecture became the “Dr. Ezeama, Chidi Elvis Moment” at Flinders University.

Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis was clearly at Flinders University, South Australia to contribute to the body of knowledge of the world, with respect to the diagnosis of malaria parasite in blood, which was going to impact largely on how the parasite is diagnosed which eventually would have an effect on how, it is treated which would in turn, reduce drug resistance cases and crash extensively, death caused by malaria infection misdiagnosis, in citizens resident in poor resource nations which are majorly African nations.

At Flinders University, Adelaide South Australia upon the completion of his Master’s programme, this young, never say die to his ambition kind of man, invented a rugged, portable, artificial intelligence powered, cost effective point of care devise which makes use of the malaria microscopy principle, which is the gold standard for malaria parasite diagnosis world over, to effectively diagnose cases of malaria parasite infection, at a relatively affordable cost for the acquisition of the devise.

FAITH, COMMUNITY SERVICE AND BEING A GLOBAL CITIZEN

Talking about Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis without clearly stating how much affection, love and reverence he has for his God, could be likened to talking about fish without making mention of water or talking about Africa without making mention of it being the richest continent in terms of mineral resources all over the world but unfortunately governed by Managers and not leaders, just as my South African Brother, public speaker and Venture Capitalist, Vusi Thembekwayo would say.

Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis was raised up as a committed Seventh Day Adventist adherent which he has never been apologetic about. He has held onto this religious and doctrinal convictions from his childhood till date.

It is on record that his love for God and ministering to people in songs, is one of the reasons he became a concert violinist. He has used these highly priced skills of being tech savvy and a concert violinist to serve God world over in ways that are not routine.

Some few years ago during some fire outbreaks in some farms in Kangaroo Island of Australia, Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis was among those who volunteered to assist the victims of the fire outbreak, being Farmers, as Community volunteers as they provided medical consultations to residents who were still recovering from the devastating effects of the fire outbreak, to help them get back to their feet.

This young man in question has grown up to become a lover of his community who is always willing to go the extra mile, to offer any form of assistance he can afford to his community as it is a form of worship to his God.

AWARDS AND RECOGNITIONS

Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis through sheer hard work, diligence, absolute trust in God with a laser beam focus on the goal, typical of what is obtainable by most Nigerian politicians, who often cast their gaze firmly on our common wealth, for selfish reasons in most cases. The awards are listed as follows.

• . Winner of Study Adelaide Award for academic excellence, in Postgraduate course work award category, at the State 2022 International Students Award.

• . First prize, outstanding project in Biomedical Engineering.

• . South Australia International Student of the year for 2022.

• . He was nominated by the department of the premier and cabinet, Government of South Australia as the member of first 40 cohort for 2022. This implies that he is one of the forty dynamic young leaders who personify the states strength now and into the future.

• . He is also a member of the MedTech Actuator Menzies 2023 Scholars.

Each year, the MedTech Actuator and The Menzies Foundation award 10 high potential researchers and clinicians a MedTech Actuator Menzies Scholarship to Aid their commercialization journey. This scholarship supports participants pathway to impact driven careers that fuse science, research and entrepreneurship.

Through the MedTech Actuator Menzies scholarship programme, the cohort will learn about commercialization and research translation, as well as Australia’s health, medical and biotechnology startup ecosystem.

“This group comprises exceptional, diverse, and promising scholars, poised to fast track their research and embark on the journey of commercialization, spanning Australia and beyond”. – Liz Gillies, CEO, of the Menzies Foundation.

FAMILY

Just as I had stated earlier, Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis is the son of a renowned and widely published Professor of Microbiology in Nigeria and his mother, is a fully licensed Nurse. He is the second son of his parents, with a brother and two remarkably beautiful sisters.

We are yet to know if there is any woman in Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis’ inner space, whom he is disposed to actively sharing his emotional space with yet, although the rumor mills seem awash, with some interesting speculations. Just like Bob Marley would say, “time definitely would tell”.

ASPIRATIONS AND AMBITIONS

For the sake of context, let me share with my beloved audience what the World Health Organization published sometime in December 2023, about Malaria and its destructive impact on our world.

Globally in 2022, there were an estimated 249 million malaria cases and 608, 000 malaria deaths in 85 countries.  It is also on record that the African region despite our very poor documentation approach with respect to data sourcing, carries a disproportionately high share of the global malaria burden.

In 2022, Africa was home to 94% of malaria cases (233 million) and 95% (580,000) of malaria deaths. Children under 5 accounted for about 80% of all malaria deaths in the region. This statistic above should stir any reasonable being terribly, to the point that we must start to ask our political leaders what they are doing in terms of the health of their citizens.

Having invented this malaria point of care device which is going to revolutionize how malaria is diagnosed all over the world with special emphasis on what it would do for resource constrained nations, Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis has just founded a Medical Device company called Biomicrology.

His ambition is to move from product design stage to the commercialization of his innovation within the shortest possible time, so that it can be used to serve humanity and reduce the number of avoidable deaths that are often recorded as a result of the misdiagnosis of malaria.

For a man who would have lost his beloved Mother in 2020, while he was in faraway Australia attending to his studies, as a result of their family mistaking COVID symptoms, for malaria parasite infection, you would understand why he is in a sort of haste to go through the process of doing his due diligence on the product, clinical trials and subsequent procedures required, before this product is deployed to resource constrained nations, to solve one of our major healthcare problems.

Finally, the story of Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis is a journey ordained from birth by his maker, which his parent’s guidance unknown to him at an early age and his dedication to his vision helped him, to arrive at.

The young man was determined, diligent and willingly to pay the necessary price for greatness. For a young man who lives on only vegetable and plant derivatives, you would be as astonished just as I am, as to where he sources for the energy with which he is gradually changing the world a step at a time. He is what dieticians call, a Vegetarian.

Indeed, this Ngwa son from Aba, Abia State in South Eastern Nigeria, West Africa, shows that if you can dare to dream, trust in God, make the necessary sacrifices required to achieve your goals, be consistent at delivering on tasks, that you would arrive at your destination someday.

The journey from a Microbiologist to a Medical Doctor and to being a Biomedical Engineer that has just invented a medical point of care device that would forever change how the diagnosis of malaria parasites are done in poor resource countries is a story of resilience, hard work, trust in God, excellence, consistency and the audacity of hope.

Unfortunately, there are so many Dr. Ezeama Chidi Elvis that are stranded in our so many rural communities with absolutely no mentors or guide, I hope this article offers you all a sense of direction in life.