Nurses and midwives, total — all countries

Nurses and midwives, total — Lower-middle-income countries

Nurses and midwives, total in lower-middle-income countries in 2018 — 4,598,627 people. Since 2010, the indicator has risen by 27.1%.

2018 4.6M people −11.04% vs 2017
World rank
Period maximum 5.17M people2017
Period minimum 3.62M people2010

Trend over time

2010–2018 · people

Nurses and midwives, total — Lower-middle-income countries, 2010–20183.5M4M4.5M5M5.5M2010201120122013201420152016201720182010: 3,617,499 people2014: 4,762,704 people2017: 5,169,160 people2018: 4,598,627 people
Change over the period: +981,128 (+27.12%) Average annual rate: 3.05 %

Comparison, 2018

How the value compares with the world and the groups this territory belongs to: Lower-middle-income countries

Lower-middle-income countries 4.6M people
World computed 27.43M people
Nurses and midwives, total — Lower-middle-income countries, by year Lower-middle-income countries All countries CSV XLSX
Year people Change Change, %
2018 4.6M −570,533 −11.04%
2017 5.17M
2014 4.76M
2010 3.62M

About the indicator

The number of nursing and midwifery personnel, from WHO. This category is almost always the largest in a health system — worldwide there are on average about three times as many nurses as physicians, and in countries with developed primary care the gap is wider still.

Important: The ratio of nurses to physicians speaks of the structure of a system: a low value usually means that physicians are doing the work of nursing care, and that is a sign of a staffing shortage rather than of an abundance of doctors.

Source: Global Health Observatory (WHO), license CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.