Out of the 72,000 registered medical doctors in Nigeria, only 35,000 are currently practising, it was learnt on Monday.

This is even as stakeholders in the Health sector blamed the high maternal and pre-natal mortality rates and poor ratio of healthcare seekers to the available healthcare givers in the country.

These revelations came to the fore at a public hearing on Bills seeking to establish health-related institutions, regulatory council and healthcare development fund organised by the Senate Committee on Health.

Sponsor of the Bill seeking to establish a Federal University of Health Sciences in Otukpo, Benue State, Abba Moro, said the university became necessary to train more medical doctors to increase their low number to meet the population of Nigerians seeking healthcare services.

He said: “From available statistics, we have 72,000 registered medical doctors in Nigeria. Out of this, only 35,000 are practising.

“The implication is that only that number is superintending over the health of over 200 million Nigerians.” This translates to one medical doctor attending to more than 5,700 Nigerians.

The Nation