The federal government has disbursed N32.9 billion to support over 8,300 primary healthcare centres nationwide, with expansion underway to reach about 13,000 facilities.`
The Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr. Iziaq Adekunle Salako, stated this Wednesday while delivering his message during the HealthCare Summit 2026 in Lagos.
The theme for the summit: “Financing Growth, Unlocking Opportunity, Building the Future of Healthcare,” speaks directly to one of the central constraint on Nigeria’s health system.
Dr Salako notesd that while government policy can set direction, without patients and well-structured private capital, deployed alongside public financing instruments, the government cannot build the hospitals, diagnostic centres and manufacturing capacity which the population of over 240 million people requires.
He said the National Health Act 2014 remains the foundational statute of the health system. Section 11 of that act established the Basic Healthcare Provision Fund (BHCPF), financed by a statutory annual grant of not less than 1% of the Consolidated Revenue Fund, which is currently being increased to 2%.
“In the last 12 years, BHCPF has disbursed a cumulative N339 billion to strengthen these gateways, of which N235 billion has been released in the last 3 years alone under the current Administration’s Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative,” he stated.
The minister added that under NHIA scheme, enrolment has grown to over 22 million lives, 35% increase since 2023, yet out-of-pocket spending still accounts for 71% of total health expenditure in Nigeria, against a global benchmark of 15 to 20%.
“As at 2023, Nigeria imports roughly 70% of the medicines, diagnostics and medical devices we consume, and this Initiative’s mandate is to make Nigeria a 70% local producer by 2030,” he stated.
Dr Salako added that government policy has been matched by concrete financial-sector instruments.