Brain Drain: 10,296 Nigerian Doctors Practice in UK, NMA Laments

Victor Ogunje in Ado Ekiti

The Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), has regretted that the menace of brain drain has been killing the country’s health sector, revealing that about 10,296 doctors now practice in United Kingdom, making Nigeria having the third highest foreign doctors in that country.

The doctors also raised the alarm over increasing maternal and infant mortality in Ekiti, hinging the incidence on the geometric loss of doctors to foreign countries.

The NMA Chairman, Ekiti Chapter, Dr. Babatunde Rosiji, said this yesterday in Ado Ekiti at a press conference to herald the 2022 Physicians’ Week.

Rosiji said: “Statistics by General Medical Council, which licenses and maintains official register of medical practitioners in the United Kingdom showed that 200 Nigerian trained doctors were licensed between August 31, 2022 and September 30, 2022.

“The statistics also showed that about 1, 307 doctors trained in Nigeria were licensed in UK as Nigeria continues to battle one of the worst situations of brain drain in history. In overall, 10,296 doctors who obtained their degrees in Nigeria currently practice in UK.”

Speaking about the rots in Ekiti health sector, the NMA leader stated that “every secondary health centres and specialists hospitals in Ekiti must have at least nine doctors, but the highest we have is two per hospital. We are supposed to have 276 doctors, but we have just 85. How do you expect us not to have high mortality?

“We need about 195 doctors to run the Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital, but we only have 95. Why should people blame doctors for the monster the government has created? For the primary, we need 32 but only have 12 and four of them will be retiring soon.”

The NMA boss regretted that four local governments in Ekiti State have no doctors to oversee their primary healthcare centres, which he said also contributed to high diseases index in the state.

Rosiji, therefore, appealed to Nigerians to be patriotic in 2023 by voting for a candidate that can rescue the country from its current difficulties, rather than placing high premium on vote buying and other pecuniary gains that could sway their positions wrongly.

“The era of blind loyalty is over. Let us all patiently wait to hear the plans of the presidential candidates for the health sector before pitching our political support for the one with the best health policy,” he said.

The former Lagos State Governor, Senator Bola Tinubu; former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and former Governor of Anambra State, Mr. Peter Obi, who are candidates of the All Progressives Congress, People’s Democratic Party and Labour Party respectively, are the three frontline presidential candidates in the race.

The NMA urged the state government to implement hazard allowance to medical doctors on its payroll, regretting that Nigerian medical practitioners remained one of the most poorly paid globally, and that the trend must change.

He said that his members might resort to industrial action if the state government failed to pay backlog of salaries owed members and implementing payment of other allowances due to them.

Rosiji said that the NMA in many states branches had offered free medical treatments and dispatched relief materials to victims of flooding in Bayelsa and other states.

As part of the activities marking the week, Rosiji stated that the NMA would offer free healthcare services to the residents of Iyin and Ikogosi Ekiti, as part of their corporate social responsibility to the state.