I've never been a fan of people using the "Dr" prefix anyhow especially people who have honorary degrees and not the educational/knowledge on it. Back in my younger days, I used to think that everyone with the "Dr." prefix attached to their names was actually a doctor who had graduated from a university in that field. I have some clergymen who had this title attached to their names and I wondered a lot how they are real doctors but decided to quit their doctor jobs to be clergymen. Little did I know that most of them acquired the title through just honorary honours.
Recently, the federal government of my country, Nigeria passed a law to restrict people with honorary awards from using the "Dr" prefix and it should be used only by people who acquired the knowledge through academics and this is also to add more value to the "Dr" prefix.
This may sound a bit simple to non-Nigerians reading this especially the nations still allowing anybody to use the "Dr" prefix, but I see this as a welcome development and it'll help to easily know people who are real doctors by knowledge, academics and education.
I feel for Doctors a lot. They passed through that long length of schooling only for people who didn't even pass through one tenth of what they passed through to compete using their names with them. Funny enough, the people who got the title through honorary are more than the registered doctors in Nigeria and they make a boast of their titles.
Other honorary titles should be looked into and stripped off too. Let anyone who wants to have an educational title be made to pass through school to get the title.
Photo: Chatgpt