s, approximately 1.4 times as large as is the State of Texas. Nigeria's population in 1989 was estimated at 115.2 million, which makes it one of the 10 largest countries in the world in the context of total population. In terms of population, Nigeria is one of the world's fastest growing countries. Nigeria's population growth is illustrated in Table 1, which may be found on the following page. The year 2105 shown in the chart is the year in which Nigeria's population is projected to stabilize.
In 1989 the population density in Nigeria was 322 persons per square mile. The country's crude death rate was 22.1 persons per 1,000 persons. The death rate has been declining since 1960 at the rate of 1.5 percent per year. The country's crude birth rate per 1,000 persons was 49 persons. The total fertility rate for Nigeria is 7.0, which is far above average for countries in its developmental classification, and is 3.7 times as high as the 1.9 rate for the United States, which is average for the western industrialized countries.
The rapid and all but unchecked population growth in Nigeria has placed significant stress on the Nigerian society. The country has been hard put to develop workable and effective public health policies as a result of this rapid population growth, which is further aggravated by the country's urbanization.
Urbanization has proceeded in Nigeria at a fast pace. In 1989, 73 percent of the country's population lived in cities of 500,000 population or larger, and 27 percent lived in the country's largest city--Lagos.
Nigeria needs to expand the scope of it national program for the eradication of preventable diseases. The emphasis in the existing national program is on smallpox, malaria, and tuberculosis. The federal government also needs to expand its corps of public health inspectors to increase the house-to-house inspection effort to detect environmental sanitation problems. Ground water clean-up i...