A visit to any of the public health institutions in Nigeria today will tell you one thing. There aren’t enough doctors to meet the teeming population.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends there be at least 1 doctor to 600 people.
The body saddled with the regulation, registration and monitoring of medical and dental practitioners in Nigeria is the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN). Doctors pay huge amounts yearly to this body for their annual practicing licence. Apart from this the body also collects fees from doctors that want to leave the country to practice elsewhere. The doctors need to collect a Letter of Good Standing from the body.
To get information from the MDCN is like getting water out of a rock. However in this report by Premium Times, after a lot of effort, the body was able to give us some important statistics:
- Number of doctors and dentists registered since 1963: 86,722 doctors and 4,357 dentists respectively
- Doctors practicing in Nigeria as of December 2017: 39,912
- Number of dentists practicing in Nigeria as of December 2017: 2901
When asked how many doctors have left the country to practice abroad, the agency directed the reporter to ask the respective countries.
Read the full report here.
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