Brain-drain: Lagos moves to establish medical varsity

By: Ade Phillips

The Lagos State government is gearing up to establish a medical university, with the aim of bolstering the training of healthcare professionals and addressing the prevalent issue of brain drain in the health sector.

Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu made this announcement during the inauguration of the Femi Gbajabiamila General Hospital in Surulere on Tuesday.

The governor said the university would be established before the end of 2024 in collaboration with the federal government.

“We found out that working with the Federal Ministry of Health, we need to scale up very aggressively all of our training and all of the youths to be trained in everything within our health space.

“We cannot sit back and fold our arms as a government that cannot intervene. And so we will, as a state, hope that other states will take this initiative and set up similar universities to be able to scale up and have between 1,000 and 1,500 doctors graduating every year.

“And this will also stem, in our view, the trend of medical personnel leaving our country,”, Sanwo-Olu said.

The governor commended the chief of staff to the president, Femi Gbajabiamila, for facilitating and handing over the secondary health facility to the state government, saying the hospital would improve access to healthcare.

At the inauguration, Gbajabiamila said the hospital was one of the many projects he had facilitated in Surulere and other parts of the state.

He said the facility, formerly a primary health centre, was equipped with a dialysis centre, CT scan, alternative power and many more to benefit the people of Surulere.

He thanked the people of Surulere for their consistent support, promising to do his best to impact lives in the area.

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