No More Shortage of Nurses in Nigeria, We Now Have Enough, Says Tunji Alausa

No More Shortage of Nurses in Nigeria — We Now Have Enough, Says Tunji Alausa

FNA News, Lagos Nigeria, 7th September, 2026.

Nigeria’s Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, says the country no longer has a shortage of nurses. He made the claim on the Afropolitan podcast, in an episode released in early September 2026, where he discussed education reform, health training and migration.

“There is no more shortage of nurses in Nigeria,” Alausa said. “Talk to anybody. We have enough nurses now.”

He tied the claim to a rapid increase in training places since President Bola Tinubu took office. On doctors, he said the government inherited a deep deficit and has since expanded medical school intake.

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“Before we came into government, we were only admitting 5,000 students into medical school, and we had 345,000 shortages of doctors,” he said. “We have also increased that annual enrolment into medical school to about 12,000 students in less than two years. The aim is to increase the annual enrolment to 20,000.”

Podcast notes from the same interview put nursing enrolment at about 28,000 a year before the current administration and more than 120,000 — in some counts up to 140,000 — today. Alausa has used similar figures in official briefings this year, including after receiving a TETFund report on planned medical simulation centres.

FNA analysis: the training boom is real. The shortage is not over.

Alausa is describing the pipeline: how many students Nigeria now admits. Patients and nurses experience a different number: how many qualified staff are on the ward, on night duty, and in public hospitals outside a few large cities.

That second number still points to a shortage.

The National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives says more than 57,000 Nigerian nurses left the country in five years. About 16,000 had moved to the United Kingdom alone by December 2025, according to NANNM President Haruna Mamman. The union cites poor pay, unsafe working conditions, insecurity, weak career progression and limited public-sector jobs.

The nurse-to-patient ratio is the clearest test of Alausa’s claim. Guidance often cited from WHO standards is about one nurse to four patients in acute care. Recent Nigerian hospital and union figures put the national picture closer to one nurse to 1,135 or 1,160 patients. In some public wards, one nurse still handles 30 to 40 patients in a shift.

A system running at that ratio does not have “enough” nurses. It has too few staff carrying unsafe loads. The pressure is worse in many rural and northern facilities than in Lagos or Abuja. Lagos officials have previously said the state alone needed tens of thousands more nurses.

There is a further gap between training and employment. Some union officials say trained nurses are working in private hospitals on low pay, or waiting for public jobs, while federal and state wards remain short-staffed. Expanding schools does not automatically fill those vacancies.

FNA’s view is that the minister is right on one point and wrong on the conclusion. Nigeria has sharply increased nursing and medical admissions. That is a significant policy shift and should continue, with proper teachers, laboratories and clinical placements.

It does not follow that the shortage is over. Until public hospitals hire more nurses, keep them in the country, and move closer to safer staffing ratios, Alausa’s claim will sound true in Abuja and false at the bedside.

Nurse across different specialities areas in Nigeria, over to you. Do you think there’s enough nursing staff in Nigeria?

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