The Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN) has raised the alarm over a growing housemanship crisis that leaves about 2,000 newly qualified doctors without placement every year, warning that the situation is fueling Nigeria’s worsening medical brain drain.
The Registrar of the Council, Dr. Fatimah Kyari, made the disclosure on Friday during the 2026 budget defence before the Senate Committee on Health in Abuja.
Dr. Kyari explained that while Nigerian medical schools now graduate approximately 6,000 doctors annually, the centralized housemanship system currently has capacity for only 4,000, leaving a third of new doctors in limbo.
“We are producing about 6,000 medical doctors every year, but the centralized housemanship system can only absorb 4,000. This gap is creating serious professional and economic uncertainty for young doctors,” she said.
To close the gap, the MDCN is advocating the immediate inclusion of state-owned and private hospitals in the centralized housemanship framework, a move she said would guarantee placement for all graduates and stabilize the health workforce.
“Expanding the system to cover state and private hospitals will ensure that all 6,000 doctors are accommodated annually and help stem the tide of brain drain,” Kyari added.
She noted that delayed or unavailable housemanship placements push many young doctors to seek opportunities abroad, further weakening Nigeria’s already overstretched healthcare system.
On funding, the MDCN Registrar decried poor budgetary releases in the 2025 fiscal year, revealing that not a single kobo was released from the Council’s ₦1.2 billion capital allocation.
According to her, only ₦37.5 million was released from the ₦100 million approved for overhead costs, while ₦13.859 billion was released from the ₦16.8 billion earmarked for personnel expenses.
In his response, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Senator Ipalibo Banigo (Rivers West), assured the Council that the Committee would work towards improved funding to strengthen its regulatory capacity and support healthcare workforce development.