EXECUTIVE Secretary of the Nigeria Christian Pilgrim Commission (NCPC), Mr. John Kennedy Opara, has said that he believed so much in zero mortality rate of pilgrims. He disclosed this recently in his office in Abuja during a courtesy visit by the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA).

He affirmed that the medical committee for the 2011 Christian pilgrimage did very well, as there was no death of pilgrims recorded on account of medical challenges, however, he said there was room for improvement.

Mr. Opara stressed that the Federal Government was interested in the welfare of pilgrims, hence the sponsorship of medical personnel to Israel to cater for their well being while in the holy land in the event of medical challenges and emergencies.

He decried the high degree of indiscipline among medical personnel on pilgrimage assignment, adding “we should be able to ensure that doctors are able to conform to the rules and ethics of the medical profession”.

The NCPC boss assured that the commission would compile the names of erring doctors with a view to handing them over to NMA for disciplinary action, explaining that the commission had transformed the entire sel-ection process for medical personnel by ensuring that every state is represented in the medi-cal team contrary to what  obt-ained in the past.

Earlier, the national president, Nigeria Medical Association (NMA), Dr. Omede Idris com-mended the NCPC boss for his giant strides since assumption of duty as the helmsman of NCPC but canvassed for the total overhaul of the medical process, especially the selection procedures of the medical doc-tors, as according to him, “the process of selecting members into the medical team was not too satisfactory”.