The United Kingdom’s General Medical Council has licensed 91 Nigerian doctors.
It was discovered that the accreditation of the 91 doctors occurred over 15 days between October 10 and October 25, 2022.
The total number of Nigerian-trained doctors in the UK now stands at 10,387. This comprises 5,210 associate specialists, 2,318 trained doctors, 1,837 general practitioners, and 1,273 specialists among the 10,387 doctors.
The accreditation of the 91 doctors came amidst cries by the Nigerian Medical Association against the brain drain bedevilling the health sector.
Apart from doctors, other categories of health workers are also migrating.
The statistics also showed that between January 1, 2022, and September 30, 2022, about 1,307 Nigerian-trained doctors were licensed in the UK as Nigeria continues to battle one of the worst brain drains in its history.
However, the data does not include Nigerian doctors who got medical qualifications in schools outside the country.
The NMA, while lamenting the high rate of medical brain drain, said Nigeria may import doctors in the future.
Nigeria has the third-highest number of foreign doctors working in the UK, after India and Pakistan.
While commenting on the situation earlier, the National President of the Medical and Dental Consultant Association of Nigeria, Dr Victor Makanjuola, said, “In the last two years, over 500 consultants, in my estimation, have left the services of government hospitals for practice abroad. All our government hospitals are consultant-led practices, which is the global standard. We have lost 500 in just two years, and we have found out that the younger ones are more likely to leave.
“To sustain the system and be able to train the next generation of medical doctors and medical students, Nigeria needs to retain the older consultants who are in their 50s and getting close to retirement so that they can stay back and train the next generation of doctors and medical students.
“Otherwise, the disaster of brain drain would be doubled because we would lose the younger ones and the older ones at about the same time, and you would find a system without consultants. This would affect the standard of care and the quality of care hospitals give.”
REPORTERS AT LARGE earlier reported that the Chairman of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) in Oyo State, Dr Wale Lasisi, has called on the government to give doctors incentives to mitigate the brain drain bedevilling the health sector.
Lasisi called in Ibadan on Tuesday at the opening of the 2022 Physicians’ Week, which is themed “Nigeria’s Healthcare Delivery System and the 2023 Democratic Transition: A Time to Change the Narrative.”
