SOCIALIST Labour, has expressed strong solidarity with medical doctors under the aegis of Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) over its ongoing nationwide strike.
The group said the strike is more than an industrial dispute; but a desperate plea to avert a public health disaster, fuelled by years of governmental neglect and chronic underfunding.
The statement, signed by Dr. James Uanhoro and Dr. Izielen Agbon, describe the doctors’ action as a direct response to a system failing at its core, with tragic, measurable consequences for the Nigerian people.
“The cost of this failure is very real for most people,” they write, pointing to stark statistics from 2021, the most reliable year on record. “At least 750,000 Nigerians died due to preventable diseases like respiratory infections, malaria, diarrhoea, and child deaths. Their blood is on the hands of the ruling class.”
The statement said at the heart of this crisis are the resident doctors themselves – medical graduates who have passed their final exams and are gaining on-the-job experience. They form the backbone of Nigeria’s healthcare system. “Four in 10 Nigerian doctors are residents, and nine in 10 doctors in our teaching hospitals are residents,” the statement notes, adding that if a Nigerian has received treatment recently, that doctor was likely a resident.
These frontline workers are now on strike, demanding payment of unpaid salaries and an end to brutal working conditions that are driving a mass exodus of medical professionals abroad, the solidarity statement stated, as it paints a grim picture of the resident doctors’ reality, describing unsustainable workloads and profound psychological distress.
“Resident doctors often work over 100 hours a week. On weekends, some work 24 to 48 hours straight with very little sleep in between,” said the statement, noting that this relentless pressure, combined with financial instability, has created a dire mental health crisis within the profession.
“The situation is so dire that about 1 in 10 residents have admitted to attempting suicide; many more have but will not admit it due to shame,” the group said, adding that this toxic environment is the primary driver of Nigeria’s brain drain. The statement also reveals that between 2019 and 2024, approximately 16,000 doctors fled Nigeria to practice overseas.
In a devastating comparison, it notes that in 2024 alone, “we graduated 4,000 doctors from medical school; the same number fled Nigeria.” With only 55,000 doctors left to serve a population of over 200 million, many Nigerian states have fewer than one doctor per 20,000 people – a far cry from the international standard of one doctor per 600.
Socialist Labour squarely places the blame on the government’s “misplaced priorities,” highlighting a stark betrayal of a continental pledge. “In 2001, African governments met in Abuja and pledged to spend at least 15% of their budgets on public health. Tinubu’s government is spending only 5% – only a third of the pledge – and less than many other African countries.”
The group also argues that the solution is not beyond Nigeria’s reach, using Cuba as an example: “Cuba has far fewer resources than Nigeria, yet it has close to one doctor for every 100 people.” The government’s failure to act, it asserts, is a choice with deadly outcomes. “We should not have to die from diseases with cures that are over 100 years old.”
The statement calls for the government to, as “a matter of national urgency,” clear all unpaid salaries, fund medical education to train more doctors, and invest in public health to ensure free treatment for all Nigerians.
With the NARD strike ongoing and healthcare workers under the Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU) poised to begin their own strike soon, the nation’s health sector is on the brink of a total shutdown, says the group, noting with a rallying cry for broad support, characterising the government as one that “has shown time and time again that it must be dragged like a donkey to see sense.”
It called on the labour movement to provide the “support and solidarity necessary for the doctors and other health sector workers to win.”
“Their victory would be a victory for all of us,” the statement affirms, framing the strike as a critical “first step in reducing the massive level of unnecessary deaths that we currently suffer.”
