Dr Ibijoke Sanwo-Olu, the wife of Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has advocated for the return of emigrant Nigerian Nigerians.
She said this as she bemoaned the rise in brain drain in the healthcare industry and said that it needed to be stopped.
At the Healthcare Transformation Coalition interactive session in Lagos with the theme “Imperatives of Addressing Brain Drain in the Health Sector,” Sanwo-wife Olu’s wife announced this.
Akin Abayomi, the state’s commissioner for health, added that brain drain was not a recent phenomenon and has been going on since Nigeria gained its independence.
He said, “It has been happening since Nigeria got its independence in 1960. Brain drain is not specific to any discipline. Brain drain is dynamic. Nigeria, especially Lagos has a massive youth purge. 70 percent of the youth is under the age of 30.
“So, our pyramid is very wide. When you look at the demographic profile of the United Kingdom, the UK, Japan and the United States of America, it is upside down.
“They have a very low birth rate so most of the people in the UK and the developed world are elderly population and their pyramid is turned upside down and that forces them to look to countries that have a proper pyramid to recruit human capital.
“So, Nigeria and Lagos by virtue of its demographic profile is a natural exporter of human expertise.”
