Nigeria vaccine bill to hit $345m as donor support vanishes

The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) says government spending on immunisation is expected to top $345 million a year by 2022 when international funding support from the Global Alliance for Vaccine Initiative (GAVI) is completely withdrawn. Nigeria lost GAVI support after a rebasing of its economy re-classed it the biggest economy in Africa […]

The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) says government spending on immunisation is expected to top $345 million a year by 2022 when international funding support from the Global Alliance for Vaccine Initiative (GAVI) is completely withdrawn.

Nigeria lost GAVI support after a rebasing of its economy re-classed it the biggest economy in Africa and ineligible for vaccine support meant for third-world countries.

NPHCDA executive director Dr Muhammad Ado said with donor support, full immunisation for children costs Nigeria an estimated $230 million yearly, but only around $85m to $90m is paid by Nigeria—the rest by donors.

Speaking in Abuja as legislators and health stakeholders from five Anglophone countries began a three-day peer review workshop to work out how each country can sustain funding for national immunisation, Ado said the $345m, rising due to introduction of new vaccines and the growing population of children who need immunisation, is expected to be funded domestically.

He cited research that’s shown every dollar spent on immunisation brings back $6 in direct return and $14 in indirect returns, insisting, “We want to change mindset, to view immunisation as an investment.”

Ado said reported slash of funding for immunisation in this year’s budget was “disturbing” but insisted the federal health ministry was engaging the National Assembly to push for appropriate funding for immunisation.

The meeting of Anglophone Kenya, Uganda, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria is expected to develop template for an “immunisation trust fund” to help each country pay for its own vaccine requirements rather than depend on donors.

“Every country has got to protect its own citizens,” said Michael McQuestion, PhD, director of sustainable immunisation financing at the Sabin Vaccine Institute, Washington DC, which supports the workshop.

“Immunisation is a public good, like having an army or airport. You have to keep immunizing or you are going to get outbreaks again. It is something a country must provide,” he said.

The trust fund is seen as national guarantees that countries will buy vaccines—a move to help push down price of vaccines secured from manufacturers, explained McQuestion.

Of the five countries, Liberia—heavily hit by the recent Ebola outbreak, looks forward to African countries producing their own vaccines, but said the Liberian government has steadily increased its counterpart contribution to vaccine from $50,000 three fiscal years ago to $500,000.

Chairman of Liberian senate committee on health Peter Coleman said Liberia was looking to increase its contribution to $600,000 in the next budget cycle and gradually take on the responsibility of paying for its own vaccines.

Senator Abdullahi Sesay, chair of health committee in the Sierra Leonean senate said any sustainable immunisation must be backed by legislation.

“You cannot have concrete immunisation financing without a law, without clauses in law that explicitly say where to get the money and how to do the funding,” Sesay said.