The Kaduna State Chapter of Nigerian Medical Association, NMA, on Monday said no fewer than 10,000 doctors left Nigeria for the United Kingdom, UK, for greener pastures in the last seven years, saying Doctors in Kaduna State are the least remunerated.
The NMA while celebrating its ‘2022 Physicians’ Week’ lamented continued brain drain in the medical profession in the last seven years, amidst deadly deceases in the country that required more medical doctors.
At a news briefing, as part of activities to mark the ‘Physicians’ Week’, the Chairman, Kaduna State NMA, Dr. Madaki Sheyin, said a Nigerian doctor is poorly paid, over worked, lacked necessary work tools and has become a target for kidnappers.
“Nigerian doctors have been rendered unimportant by successive governments for inadequate attention to the heath sector.
The one week medical activities has the theme, “Nigeria’s Healthcare Delivery System and The 2023 Democratic Transition: A Time To Change The Narrative’, is in tandem with the most important upcoming event in Nigeria while the sub-themes’, Mitigating The Impact Of Brain Drain On The Dwindling Human Resource For Health In Nigeria and Health Sector Reforms In The Face Of Emerging Public Health Threats’, were chosen as continued reminder to our governments that things are falling apart in the health sector.
“The issue of progressive depletion of human resource for health cannot be over emphasized. With the recent article from an Online Newspaper of 9th October 2022 titled “200 Nigerian Doctors Move to UK in One Month’, the fact that checks on the website of the General Medical Council, GMC, the body which licenses and maintains the official register of medical practitioners in the UK, showed that the GMC licensed at least 200 Nigerian-trained doctors between August 31, 2022, and September 30, 2022 was revealed.
“The statistics also showed that between January 1, 2022 and September 30, 2022, about 1,307 doctors trained in Nigeria were licensed in the UK as Nigeria continues to battle one of the worst situations of brain drain in its history. Overall, 10,296 doctors who obtained their degrees in Nigeria currently practice in the UK.
“Dispersion of the emigration data for Nigeria trained doctors to UK is as follows: 233 in 2015, 279 in 2016, 475 in 2017, 852 in 2018, 1,347 in 2019, 833 in 2020 in spite of COVID Pandemic and 932 in 2021 during recovery from COVID.
“The Kaduna Doctor is even worse hit by this poor welfare conditions, doctors in the State’s employ as at today receive only 60 percent of the CONMESS salary scale, a far cry from what those in the Federal and other States are receiving. We call on our Governments to quickly declare emergency action in Nigeria’s health sector for the sake of her citizens”.
“This alongside insecurity is largely responsible for the high turnover of doctors in the state and mass exodus causing both internal and external brain drain”.
The doctors therefore appealed to Kaduna state government to immediately implement the report of the Committee on Review of Medical Doctors and other health workers’ salaries in Kaduna State and also domesticate the newly approved hazard allowance for doctors.
