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Chapter 10 of AHOP's Nigeria Health Systems and Services Profile.
Key messages
- Poor performance in essential service coverage in Nigeria is largely due to poor service capacity and access, particularly poor infrastructure and inadequate human resource capacity. This leads to gaps in the availability of essential health services.
- Nigeria’s Universal Health Coverage Social Coverage Index score, which measures universal health coverage, is low (38.4%), primarily due to poor health infrastructure and inadequate human resource capacity.
- Nigeria lags far behind its regional and global peers in terms of health insurance coverage, and the most vulnerable populations lack access to financial risk protection. Out-of-pocket payments as a proportion of total health expenditure are extremely high (75%), and 15.8% of multigenerational households experience catastrophic health expenditure over the 10% threshold, significantly higher than the World Health Organization African Region average (9.4%).
- Preparedness for public health emergencies is poor, as indicated by the low Global Health Security Index score of 38.0 in 2021 and the downwards trend in the country’s International Health Regulations core capacity score since 2022. Critical capacities to monitor and detect zoonotic diseases and dispense medical countermeasures for national use during public health emergencies need to be expanded and sustained.
- No nationally representative data are available on user satisfaction with essential health services, and a national survey is needed to inform future service provision.