Summit to address poor health coverage

It comes as millions of Nigerians are still without any health cover and lack access—financially and geographically—to healthcare, while 70% still pay for their health care from their pockets.Minister of Health, Onyebuchi Chukwu has called the presidential summit a “game changer that will lead to a paradigm shift in the way we deliver health in […]

It comes as millions of Nigerians are still without any health cover and lack access—financially and geographically—to healthcare, while 70% still pay for their health care from their pockets.
Minister of Health, Onyebuchi Chukwu has called the presidential summit a “game changer that will lead to a paradigm shift in the way we deliver health in Nigeria.”
“We want it to be a clear statement for all governments [that] it is a national project,” the minister said at a pre-summit briefing in Abuja.
At least five separate initiatives have been implemented since independence in Nigeria—including Basic Health Services in the ‘70s, Health for All by the Year 2000, Achieving the Millennium Development Goals, National Strategic Health Development Plan and Action Push Agenda—with limited success.
Chukwu said universal health coverage was crucial to Nigeria’s vision to be among top 20 nations by 2020, but insisted health for majority of Nigerians required that health infrastructure and services be both available and accessible.
The summit will consider how healthcare delivery adheres to standards and the manner of referrals among facilities, as well seek high-level political commitment to universal health coverage.
“This is the beginning of a journey. There is no way within one year we will get 100% but we have never tried it at all in Nigeria, so this is the beginning,” said Chukwu.