By Chioma Obinna, Esther Onyebula & Modinat Amusat

LAGOS — THE 56th meeting of the National Council on Health, NCH, has opened in Lagos, with a declaration that Nigeria is still far from achieving the Millennium Development Goals, MDGs, on health ahead of the 2015 deadline.

NCH, which is the gathering of health policy makers in the country, equally rated the health sector across the federation low.

Speaking at the opening of the technical session, Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, said despite the achievements made so far in the health sector, the indices were still not cheering indicating that Nigeria was far from where it should be.

While acknowledging government’s efforts and the enormous challenges to Nigeria’s environment, he said: “We have huge population on our hands, high poverty among the people and the issue of available quality care. Our goal is to satisfy the people but once they complain, then it means we have more work to do.”