The recent alarm raised in the medical circle about the exodus of Nigerian doctors is very worrisome and government at all levels must rise to the challenge and stem the dangerous tide.
Virtually all public hospitals across the country which are expected to provide affordable healthcare services are losing their medical personnel in large numbers on regular basis.
While countries like the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada have become the preferred destinations for our medical doctors, not too long ago, a Saudi Arabian recruitment agent came to hunt for its own share of Nigerian healthcare personnel. It was reported that over 200 of them showed up, determined to join the long list of Nigerian professionals who have sought ‘better life’ outside the shores of the country because of the harsh work environment, poor remunerations, lack of motivation and heavy workload.
Most of the Saudi-bound doctors were reported to have said that as medical doctors who work at odd long hours, their pay was not commensurate with their job demands, hence the decision to “check out”.
As at the last count, there are about 5,405 Nigerian trained medical doctors working in the United Kingdom, and about 26,000 practising in the United States, making a total of 77% of all black doctors in that country besides other European countries, the Middle East and South Africa.
Nigeria with a population of 200m has a doctor to patient ratio of between 1: 1,300 and 1: 1,500. The annual turnover of doctors is put at 3,000. The low output is not unconnected with many factors such as inability to graduate enough doctors, stagnancy of students at medical schools and lack of standard medical schools in universities, making it impossible to admit many candidates wishing to read medicine every year.
For instance, it was reported at one time that the Kogi State University stagnated its medical students on 300 Level for five years because the College of Medicine had not been granted accreditation. This was due to lack of adequate infrastructure, equipment, facilities and personnel. As a way out of the quagmire, the university management was said to have advertised for clinicians and nobody applied because of prevailing uncertainties in the state civil service and even in the university. The federal and state governments are not paying attention to the foundation of social service, starting from funding of medical schools; instead they politicise everything including building universities without adequate funding.
It is, therefore, not a surprise that Nigerian professionals and doctors in particular are leaving the country in droves as confirmed recently by the state chairmen of the Nigerian Medical Association. A report made available not too long ago by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation said Nigeria and other countries in Africa lose $2bn annually to brain drain in the health sector, stressing that good governance may never be achieved on the continent if investments in public services are not sufficient.
This ugly trend cannot be reversed overnight. It may also be difficult to bring back those who have found sanctuary outside of the country, but institutionalised efforts and consistency in deliberate policy initiatives to change the narrative may begin to yield fruits in the near future.
It is worrisome enough that things had deteriorated but it is tragic that the government is yet to realise the need to begin to invest in human capital development. The migration from Nigeria is not confined to medical personnel alone. Most young and middle aged people of different callings are moving to all parts of the world in search of greener pastures. The craze was heightened during the recession and it has continued even after the country exited the economic meltdown as evidenced by the unemployment rate increasing yearly and many losing their jobs, due to the collapse of the manufacturing sector which is the biggest employer of labour.
Obviously, things cannot continue this way except the government wants the nation to grind to a total halt. We urge the Buhari government to strengthen its hands on the plough by seeking more ways to create a conducive atmosphere for job generation and reviving ailing industries through injection of funds. Moreover, the medical field is too fragile to be left unattended and it is the responsibility of government to create the enabling environment. A stitch in time, they say, saves nine. Most Nigerians that opted to work overseas did so as the last option. Only nationals of countries at war leave their country the way Nigerians flee their fatherland.
Nigerians have not forgotten Buhari’s 1984 declaration that Nigerian hospitals had been reduced to mere consulting clinics when he swept his way to power. At the rate our doctors are exiting the country, there may be no doctor to consult in our various hospitals in the not too distant future! That would not only be an irony but also a tragedy under his watch.
