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‘Nigeria needs 3m dental surgeons to boost oral healthcare’

The newly elected dean of the Faculty of Dentistry at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Prof Felix Chukwuneke has raised the alarm on the dearth of dental surgeons in the country. Prof Chukwuneke, who is a renowned oral and maxillofacial surgeon, explained that with a population of over 190 million people, the current small…

Surgeons

The newly elected dean of the Faculty of Dentistry at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Prof Felix Chukwuneke has raised the alarm on the dearth of dental surgeons in the country.

Prof Chukwuneke, who is a renowned oral and maxillofacial surgeon, explained that with a population of over 190 million people, the current small size of dental surgeons was grossly inadequate, stressing that Nigeria needs over three million dental surgeons to boost oral health care and for the effective coverage of the 36 states of Nigeria and Abuja.

Chukwuneke, who recorded a landslide victory at the election, graduated at the University of Nigeria in 1991.

He joined the institution in 2005 as Lecturer II and rose rapidly to the highest academic status of professor in 2015, the first by an alumnus of UNN since 1960.

In his acceptance speech, he thanked the Vice Chancellor of the University Of Nigeria, Prof. Chukwuma Ozumba, for giving him the opportunity to serve and promised to move the faculty to the next level in education and research.

The new dean encouraged more students to study dentistry, saying the course is very lucrative globally.

The election, which was supervised by the deputy vice chancellor of the University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus, Prof. Edith Nwosu, was very peaceful. 

Chukwuneke, who hails from Oba, Idemili-South Local Government Area of Anambra State, is the first and only Alumnus Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery in the University of Nigeria since its inception in 1960.  

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