•Ndagi Alhassan
The Registrar of the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria, Ndagi Alhassan, has raised concerns that some states in the country employ fewer than 100 nurses annually despite a growing shortage of healthcare workers.
He described the situation as worrisome, given the rising demand for quality health services across the country.
Speaking exclusively with our correspondent, Alhassan explained that the limited recruitment of nurses is worsening the burden on the few available professionals, who are already stretched thin by long hours, poor welfare, and increasing cases of brain drain, reports The PUNCH.
He warned that this trend, if unchecked, could further cripple the healthcare system.
The NMCN boss stressed that while Nigeria produces thousands of nurses every year, the lack of adequate employment opportunities at the state level undermines both service delivery and workforce morale.
According to him, the persistent shortfall in nurse employment is contributing to burnout among existing staff and weakening the health system’s capacity to deliver quality care, especially in rural and underserved communities.
Alhassan said, “The truth of the matter is that the government needs to face its responsibility and employ unemployed nursing graduates. If you examine the employment statistics from all states and teaching hospitals over the last three years, it’s a very poor record.
“In fact, if you go to many of the healthcare institutions, particularly in some states, they barely employ up to 100 nurses in the whole state yearly. Those are the issues. We are turning these people out en masse. The problem is not production. The problem is employment.”
Nurses across the country recently embarked on a nationwide strike that lasted a few days. During the industrial action, hospitals across Nigeria witnessed a significant disruption in medical services as nurses under the aegis of the National Association of Nigerian Nurses and Midwives crippled medical facilities’ operations for four days.
The industrial action, which started on July 30, 2025, and was planned for seven days, was called off on August 2, 2025, after the nurses’ leadership and the Federal Government team met. Before the strike, the union had, on July 14, 2025, issued a 15-day ultimatum to the federal government, demanding immediate intervention to prevent a total healthcare shutdown.
Some of the demands of the nurses are the upward review of shift allowance, uniform allowance adjustment, a separate salary structure for nurses, increased core duty allowance, mass employment of nurses, and the establishment of a nursing department in the Federal Ministry of Health, among others.
Meanwhile, rising from the meeting on August 1, the apex government pledged to gazette the long-awaited nurses’ scheme of service within four weeks as part of measures to address key demands of the nurses, particularly those related to career progression, welfare, and internship placements.
This pledge formed part of a Memorandum of Understanding reached at the end of a conciliation meeting convened by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Maigari Dingyadi, and attended by the Coordinating Minister for Health and Social Welfare, Prof Muhammad Pate, and the leadership of NANNM.
The gazetting of the nurses’ scheme of service, originally approved by the National Council on Establishments in 2016, in Minna, Niger State, is a document that outlines the career structure, qualifications, job descriptions, and progression pathways for public servants in Nigeria, including nurses and other professionals.
But speaking further with our correspondent, Alhassan stated that unemployment, rather than the mass migration of health workers, is the main challenge facing the nursing profession in Nigeria.
“It’s simple: nurses are not being employed. We tried to look at it from the rural perspective and created a Community Nursing, Community Midwifery programme so the graduates from these programmes can serve in remote and hard-to-reach areas. When they bring their ward for training and he or she is trained and returned to the community, because that is their base, they will have the desire and eagerness to serve their people.
“But even after we produce these graduates, they are not being employed by the local government. The primary healthcare facilities are there, but there is no personnel to serve. That is the essence of producing these people. But no one is engaging them. Those are the issues,” he added.
According to him, the government is not engaging the products that are out of the schools; some of them are just lingering around, and some are going to private facilities.
To bridge the brain drain, Alhassan said the council expanded the number of index admissions and also increased the number of training institutions.
“The average annual intake is almost 115,000 into the programme, because both colleges and universities are running it. Based on that, we have a good number, even if people keep on travelling or leaving.
“That’s why, wherever I go, my request is always the same — three key things, and a fourth. Number one is employment. Number two, supply of equipment and a better working environment. Thirdly, improved remuneration. The fourth is training and retraining. All these are key focuses that will maintain the health system. But as long as we’re not doing this, the system will continue to suffer,” he said.
He said the council had embarked on reforms and transitioned schools to colleges, where students now obtain ND and HND, and also expanded postgraduate programmes.
“Now, the key thing we are agitating for is the implementation of Advanced Nursing Practice and the Doctorate of Nursing. These proposals have been put forward, but the government has not responded.
“Nonetheless, we now organise Mandatory Continuing Professional Development Programmes, which nurses participate in to update their knowledge and skills. We have reviewed our curriculum such that, in any emerging situation—including emergency preparedness and issues related to maternal mortality — we have strategies to address them. Even mental health issues have been expanded into our curriculum and included in MCPDP for in-service nurses, so they can render proper service.
“But the government needs to support the training. When people apply for training, they should be supported to develop their careers while serving. But due to the inadequate number of nurses, even releasing them for training is a problem.
That’s why I’m campaigning for more engagement—to enable sufficient funding for continuous development and targeted service delivery,” Alhassan said.
