Amid simmering ethnic and religious tensions, disasters, and disease outbreaks, health services in Nigeria continued to suffer from a lack of resources.

A Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) emergency response unit based in Sokoto state, in the northwest, distributed relief items and basic medical care to thousands of families displaced by flooding, tended to patients after outbreaks of measles and meningitis, and, between August and November, treated 9,481 patients in Katsina, Bauchi and Borno states.

In central Nigeria, emergency teams responded to cholera and measles outbreaks in Kaduna and Plateau states, while vaccinating more than 15,600 children and treating around 2,600 patients for measles in Kaduna. Teams also provided medicines and supplies to health facilities in Jos after the area was hit with waves of intercommunal violence.

In July, MSF began working at the Aiyetoro health centre in the Lagos slum of Makoko, providing general and reproductive healthcare, and emergency care for patients most commonly afflicted with malaria, respiratory infections, and chronic diseases. MSF also ran mobile clinics in Otto and, in early 2011, in the Badia and Riverine lagoon areas.

Given the lack of access to healthcare for women in Nigeria, a mobile medical team in Sokoto state supported the Goronyo health centre and surrounding villages, providing general healthcare, obstetric and pediatric care, and a feeding program, along with a prevention of mother-to-child transmission program for pregnant women with HIV. In Jigawa state, 402 women underwent surgery to repair fistulas caused by long, unattended or complicated labour, and MSF's centre in Jahun offered comprehensive emergency obstetric and neonatal care, which can prevent fistulas from occurring. Public awareness campaigns focused on the importance of giving birth in a medical facility seemed to have an impact as well; there were 3,649 deliveries in the maternity ward in 2010, more than double the number in 2009.

Also in Jigawa, a team working from Kazaure hospital cared for more than 6,600 severely malnourished children in June following a regional nutrition crisis.

In the Niger Delta, MSF staff treated 10,850 people in the emergency department of Port Harcourt's Teme hospital, 42 per cent of whom were injured by violence. Using internal fixation to repair fractures, the teams drastically reduced the time people had to spend in the hospital. More than 2,000 patients were admitted to the trauma centre. More than 3,500 surgical interventions were carried out. Medical care and counselling was also provided to 645 survivors of sexual violence.

MSF handed over the health centre it had been running in Bayelsa state's Ogbia district since 2008 to local and national authorities, as planned, but responded to episodes of severe lead poisoning in seven villages in Zamfara state, where small-scale gold miners brought iron-ore into their homes, leading to heavy metal contamination. At the request of the Ministry of Health, MSF treated more than 400 children and staff worked with villagers to raise awareness of the risks they faced.

MSF has worked in Nigeria since 1996.