Nigeria Invests in 1 Million Midwives to Save Lives

A healthcare workforce shortage is being met with one of the smartest solutions in global health, and Nigeria is at the forefront of making it happen.

The world needs nearly one million more midwives, and this year's International Day of the Midwife isn't just marking a calendar date. It's launching a concrete plan to train, deploy, and support the healthcare workers who deliver the highest return on investment for saving mothers and babies.

Nigeria has already taken bold steps with its new Strategic Directions for Nursing and Midwifery 2025-2030. This five-year national framework addresses not just training gaps, but the real challenges that keep midwives from reaching women who need them most: deployment to underserved areas, fair wages, essential supplies, and safe working conditions.

The numbers tell a powerful story about why this matters. Universal coverage of midwifery services could prevent 67% of maternal deaths, 64% of newborn deaths, and 65% of stillbirths. That translates to 4.3 million lives saved every year by 2035.

Africa carries the heaviest burden of this shortage. Nine in ten women across the continent live in countries without enough midwives, driven by population growth and decades of underinvestment in healthcare workers.

But midwives do far more than attend births. Skilled midwives can deliver up to 90% of essential sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn and adolescent health services. They provide care before, during, and after pregnancy, detecting complications early before they become emergencies.

The Ripple Effect

This community-based approach creates waves of positive change that extend far beyond individual births. Midwives connect entire households to antenatal care, family planning, nutrition counseling, immunization, and timely referrals when specialized care is needed.

In rural and underserved areas where distance, transportation, and cost prevent many women from reaching hospitals, midwives become trusted bridges to healthcare. They're often based in the communities they serve, making care more accessible and more likely to be used.

The efficiency argument is compelling too. Many health systems have invested heavily in expensive, hospital-based specialist care while neglecting primary and community-based services. This means women often reach care only when complications have become severe, requiring costly emergency interventions and surgeries that could have been prevented.

Midwife-led care models cost less, prevent more complications, and reach more women where they live. In a world where healthcare budgets are tightening, investing in midwives means every dollar delivers more impact.

Nigeria's comprehensive approach tackles the full picture: training more midwives, employing them, posting them to communities that need them most, and creating systems that help them succeed. These reforms recognize that having skilled professionals isn't enough if they can't do their jobs effectively.

Progress in maternal health over the past two decades proves change is possible, and Nigeria's investment in midwives shows the path forward for protecting those gains and accelerating them.