This is the second part of my tribute to Colonel Henry Afolabi David, the third of my bosom buddies, who died in the last sixteen months. But I have had to change the headline from “Adieu Colonel David my soul mate and brother,” because of the importance of health in human life. If I retained last week’s title it would not be realized that the focus in this piece is on how to live long. And as result many may not bother to read it, thinking it is still on extolling my friend as a good person and man of remarkable achievements.
I am highlighting health today because eighty per cent of my pals, relatives and others I knew who went to glory in the last five years lost their lives or sight because of their failure to do medical check – up every year, two, three or four years. Consequently it was when they took ill that they came to know that their organs had been afflicted with deadly diseases and already cancerous. While those of them with cataract or glaucoma or both did not know they had eye problem until they started seeing dimly or went blind suddenly.
One of the six close ones I lost between 2012 and 2017 was diabetic for years and had glaucoma but did not know because he did not go for blood sugar test and eye tests. By the time he noticed he had these problems and went to London to see his doctor for tests, it was too late. His blood sugar which should not have been more than 70 – 120 milligrams or so, was over three hundred mg, indeed close to 400mg. Eventually, he began seeing faintly and was totally blind in his last twelve years on earth. The final straw that led to his demise was the heart problem he had about three years ago and worsened with time. He was a billionaire businessman with houses in the United Kingdom and the United States, so his problem was not money but carelessness.
My second friend was also diabetic. But he was lucky to have gone for blood sugar test about twenty years ago and with the drugs his doctor recommended he was able to control the disease. But he never bothered to check his prostate gland and the other vital organs because he had no pains. By the time he too went to London to see his doctor, his prostate gland was cancerous. He was away in Britain for five months and died about a week after he returned to Lagos. He was a multi-million naira businessman with two houses in England.
My third pal who was financially comfortable also had prostate enlargement, but went to the hospital about five years ago. Although it had not become cancerous, but it was in such a state that he had to undergo an operation that cost him close to two million naira in a Lagos hospital. But he failed to do medical tests on his other organs. It was when he took ill two years ago that it was discovered his kidney and liver were diseased. He also had blood issue and was bedridden in his last one year on earth.
From these stories it should be clear that men and women from the age of forty or fifty should be doing regular medical tests of their vital organs like the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, pancreas, prostate gland and additionally for women, their womb. They and men should touch their breasts every week or month to feel if there is a lump there. That was what saved me in 1967 when I had to do surgical operation at the University College Hospital (UCH) Ibadan in my final session at the University of Ibadan to remove the lump in the affected breast.
As for diabetes people should buy the apparatus to test their blood sugar at home on a daily basis, every other day or once a week. Or go to a hospital or pharmacy to do so every month or two months.
The importance of exercises which could be jogging, running, skipping rope, swimming, playing football, table or lawn tennis, squash or walking cannot be over-emphasized. The reason is that such activities help in preventing or controlling diabetes and heart problem. But such exercises should be carried out every day or at least twice or thrice a week. For those who for age or other reasons cannot engage in vigorous sporting activities they should limit themselves to walking.
But such trekking has to be over a distance and done briskly for about thirty minutes or an hour. Not leisure walking or strolling because one must sweat. But those who are new to exercising should consult their doctors before starting and must begin gently and with light exercises for a few minutes before engaging in the strenuous ones.
God bless Pastor Lazarus Muoka (9)
It is good that the pastors of orthodox churches and a few Pentecostal ones preach salvation instead of the prosperity most in the latter group concentrate on. But I think the clergy men and women who carry the message of salvation should go beyond announcing in their churches that people should not bring money made through rituals and criminal or fraudulent activities as offerings, tithes or to build or renovate a church or buy cars for the priests or donated for charity in the House of God. I don’t believe this can stop such hypocritical Christians from their evil ways or drive them away from the church. What can stop criminals, crooks and those who engage in rituals from bringing money made from sinful or illegal acts is to follow the examples of Moses in Deuteronomy 27:11 – 26 and Apostle John in Revelation 22:18 – 19, which was placing curses on anyone who would go against the laws and teachings of God they had told them.
It is either modern – day pastors and prophets do this or offer prayers during their services that God should cause such nefarious people to change their evil ways. And that if they do not repent that they should be caught by law enforcement agents and jailed by the courts in the name of Jesus. It is only if priests do this that depreciable characters involved in such sinful acts will stop coming to worship in their churches.