With a population of nearly 8,000, Nigeria has the third-highest population of foreign doctors practising in the United Kingdom.
A total of 7,875 Nigerian doctors are currently practising in the European nation.
With 29,228 and 14,470 respectively, only India and Pakistan rank above the West African nation in the number of foreign doctors in the UK.
This was revealed in the official register of medical practitioners maintained by the UK’s General Medical Council (GMC).
According to The Punch, a check of GMC’s website on Thursday showed that the number of Nigerian doctors working in the UK spiked from 7,870 to 7,875 in one week.
The disturbing trend comes amidst concerns about brain-drain as Nigeria’s doctor-to-patient ratio remains one of the worst in the world. The Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) stated in 2019 that there were 40,000 doctors to 196 million Nigerians.
There are currently 74,543 doctors registered with the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN).
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But according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), Nigeria has a physician-to-patient ratio of four doctors to 10,000 patients. The US ratio is 26 doctors per 10,000 people and the UK has 28 doctors to 10,000.
The Herald recalls that 58 doctors were stopped from migrating to the United Kingdom at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos.
The Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) explained that the doctors did not possess visas.
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