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The recent revelation by Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State that the state has shortage of about 40,000 doctors and about 40,000 nurses has further underlined the gravity of the nation’s health crisis. The governor also reiterated that Lagos State requires at least N100billion above current budgetary allocation to meet the healthcare needs of its growing population.
Sanwo-Olu, who stated this at the opening of the second Eko Health Convention held at Oriental Hotel, Victoria Island, Lagos, identified dearth of health workers and paucity of funding as the two biggest challenges facing the state’s health system, amid shrinking donor funding for disease control. According to the governor, “Lagos needs about 40,000 doctors to properly serve its population, but we currently have about 7,000. We also require approximately 40,000 more nurses. That means every doctor presently working in Lagos today is effectively doing the work of about 10 doctors.”
However, the state has taken some measures to address the manpower challenge. Apart from large-scale recruitment of clinical personnel across 29 secondary healthcare facilities in the state and enhanced welfare packages, the state is planning to establish a University of Medicine and Health Sciences. The improved workers’ welfare will enable it retain current personnel and woo those abroad to return. Also, the enrollment under the state’s Ilera Eko Health Insurance Scheme had reached 1,502,994 as of May 2026. More of half of the beneficiaries were women. This has undoubtedly increased access to healthcare services in the state.
The shortage of medical doctors and other health workers is not peculiar to Lagos State. It is a national malaise that needs to be urgently addressed. If Lagos State, considered to be one of the best in the country in terms of healthcare services, is having this challenge, it will indeed be worse in other states with low resources. Available statistics show that Lagos State has over 7,385 medical doctors. It is followed by the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) with about 4,453 doctors, Rivers, 2,194, Enugu, 2,070, and Oyo, 1,996.
In a related development, a medical expert, Prof. Akin Osibogun, has stated that Nigeria will need to increase its health workforce by almost eightfold to adequately respond to its disease burden. The medic, who spoke at the inaugural Biennial Presidential Colloquium of the Academy of Medical Sciences in Lagos, identified shortage of healthcare professionals as one of the biggest threats to quality healthcare delivery. Osibogun’s timely warning must be heeded by federal and state governments.
The brain drain in the health sector has worsened the shortage of doctors, nurses and other health professionals to the extent that retaining those in practice in the country is a daunting task. More than 16,000 to 20,000 Nigerian medical doctors have emigrated to Europe and America, leaving the country with about 55,000 licensed physicians to serve a population of over 220 million.
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A new report has shown that no fewer than 16,000 doctors left Nigeria in a five-to seven-year window. Over 15,000 Nigerian-trained doctors are practising in the United Kingdom (UK) alone. Another report also revealed that about 20,966 Nigerian health workers migrated abroad in one year. They include 3,919 doctors, 7,487 nurses and midwives, 6,861 medical laboratory professionals, 702 pharmacists, 658 physiotherapists and other specialists.
Reasons abound why Nigerian doctors and other health professionals migrate to United States, United Kingdom, Canada and countries in the Middle East. Apart from low pay and irregular salaries, there are excessive unregulated working hours and heavy patient loads and lack of advanced diagnostic tools, reliable power and basic hospital equipment. The general insecurity in the country has led to abduction of medical doctors and avoidable deaths in the hands of abductors.
Avenues for specialised postgraduate training are constrained. Resident doctors in the country are always on strike over welfare issues. The dream of every student in the medical and allied sciences is to graduate, get the licence and migrate abroad in search of better conditions of service. With the high pay abroad, it will be extremely difficult to retain our medical doctors and nurses.
The health services in Lagos and other states cannot improve without adequate funding. Lagos State says it needs about N100billion to meet its health funding gap. Other states should emulate Lagos and chart a new roadmap to improve health funding and access to health services to achieve universal health coverage. The federal and state governments must intentionally increase their annual health budgets.
The Federal Government should move away from the four to five per cent of its annual budget for years and dedicate 15 per cent of its annual budget to health, in line with the Abuja 2001 declaration by African leaders. No doubt, a healthy nation is a wealthy nation. However, Nigeria can truly be a wealthy nation if the health funding gaps and shortage of doctors, nurses and other health professionals are adequately addressed forthwith.
