Lagos State faces a shortage of about 40,000 doctors and 40,000 nurses, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu has said, warning that the state’s healthcare system also requires at least ₦100 billion beyond its current budgetary allocation.
Sanwo-Olu disclosed this on Thursday while speaking at the opening of the second Eko Health Convention at the Oriental Hotel in Victoria Island, Lagos.
He identified healthcare workforce shortages and inadequate funding as the two major challenges confronting the state’s health sector, while also warning that declining donor funding could put additional pressure on disease-control programmes.
“Lagos needs about 40,000 doctors to serve this population properly. We have about 7,000. We need roughly 40,000 more nurses. Every doctor in Lagos today is, in effect, doing the work of 10,” the governor said.
He added that the state faces a significant funding gap between its current health budget and the resources required to adequately serve its growing population.
“The second gap is money. There is a shortfall of at least N100bn between what our health budget provides and what this system genuinely requires.
“Donor financing, which supported much of our disease control for two decades, is contracting sharply and will not return in its old form.”
Sanwo-Olu said his administration was responding to the workforce shortage through increased recruitment, improved welfare and accommodation for health workers, alongside plans to establish a University of Medicine and Health Sciences.
“We have recruited aggressively, and last month opened clinical recruitment across all twenty-nine of our secondary facilities.
“We have built accommodation for health workers. We are improving conditions to slow the departures and, increasingly, to attract colleagues back,” he said.
The governor also disclosed that more than 1.5 million Lagos residents are enrolled in the state’s Ilera Eko health insurance scheme.
He said the figure stood at 1,502,994 as of the end of May, with women accounting for more than half of the enrollees.
“Today, more than one and a half million Lagosians are enrolled in Ilera Eko.
“As at the end of May this year, the figure stood at 1,502,994. More than half are women.
“And utilisation is rising, which tells us something important: that coverage is translating into actual care and not merely into cards in wallets,” Sanwo-Olu said.
He further disclosed that the Lagos State Health Management Agency’s Assistance in Distress programme had saved 18 lives since its launch in March.
“Since it became operational in March, that programme has saved 18 lives… Road traffic injuries, surgical emergencies, obstetric crises, strokes. Eighteen people who are alive because the system did not stop to ask whether they could afford to be,” he said.
Beyond funding and workforce expansion, the governor said Lagos was deploying technology to modernise healthcare delivery through the Lagos Smart Health Information Platform, which is being implemented across public health institutions.
The platform is expected to allow medical records to be accessed across healthcare facilities, strengthen disease surveillance and support evidence-based health planning.
Sanwo-Olu also said the state was investing in artificial intelligence and other digital technologies to improve diagnosis, medical imaging and healthcare delivery.
He reaffirmed his administration’s focus on creating institutions and systems that can continue operating beyond his tenure.
“We have kept our promises. Now we are building the systems that will keep them long after us,” he said.
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