Lagos, January 19, 2025 — Nigeria should institutionalise devoted, long-term healthcare funding to maintain the nation’s rising healthcare industrial increase and safe its future as a regional healthcare manufacturing hub. This was stated by the keynote speaker, Prof Lere Baale, on the Codix Group Dinner themed “Sustaining Nigeria’s Healthcare Industrial Boom: The Need for Dedicated Healthcare Funding”.
In his keynote handle, the famend Professor of Pharmacy Prof. Baale famous that Nigeria’s present healthcare transformation as a historic however fragile second that requires deliberate {financial} structure to endure.
According to him, “Nigeria is experiencing a healthcare industrial awakening—a shift from dependency to capability, from imports to local value creation. The boom is real, however, there is a call for us to sustain it.”
He stated Nigeria’s healthcare and pharmaceutical ecosystem has undergone a quiet however profound transformation lately. Indigenous producers are increasing manufacturing capability, diagnostic corporations are investing in native meeting and innovation, regulatory confidence is enhancing, expert professionals are returning, and regional and worldwide partnerships are deepening.
He attributed this progress to a convergence of necessity and management, pushed by classes from world provide chain disruptions, the COVID-19 pandemic, international alternate volatility, and extra intentional regulatory alignment with nationwide industrial priorities.
“What we are witnessing is not just growth; it is industrial possibility—the emergence of healthcare as a strategic pillar of national development,” he stated.
Despite these positive aspects, Prof. Baale warned that the absence of structured, long-term, inexpensive healthcare-specific financing threatens the sustainability of the sector.
He pressured that healthcare manufacturing is capital-intensive, with lengthy gestation intervals, heavy upfront funding, stringent regulatory necessities, superior know-how wants, and a reliance on extremely expert human capital—but it’s typically financed like short-term buying and selling exercise.
“A healthcare industrial boom without dedicated funding is like a factory without power—it may exist, but it cannot operate optimally,” he said.
He known as for devoted healthcare funding is a strategic necessity that might stabilise provide, enhance high quality and regulatory compliance, create high-value jobs, shield nationwide safety, and entice world funding.
He emphasised that medicines, diagnostics, and medical consumables ought to be handled as strategic nationwide property, not atypical commodities.
Prof. Baale outlined a complete seven-point framework aimed toward institutionalising sustainable healthcare financing in Nigeria. This include- a name to extend the Basic Healthcare Provision Fund (BHCPF) from the present one per cent to 3 per cent of consolidated authorities income, reflecting the strategic significance of healthcare to nationwide productiveness and safety. He additional proposed that the expanded fund be strategically domiciled with the Bank of Industry (BOI), working in shut coordination with the Federal Ministry of Health and supported by structured Medipool preparations on the state and native authorities ranges to make sure environment friendly, clear, and well timed disbursement of funds.
He additionally pressured the necessity for strict fee self-discipline throughout the healthcare worth chain, recommending a assured fee turnaround time of not more than 30 days to make sure cash-flow predictability, which he described as crucial to manufacturing sustainability.
He additionally known as for the institution of a revolving healthcare fund to make sure continuity and long-term capital availability, slightly than reliance on one-off interventions. Prof. Baale additional known as for the implementation of a assured gross sales and offtake framework to offer market assurance, encourage capability enlargement, and assist high quality enhancements throughout the sector. Collectively, he famous that these measures would create a mutually reinforcing, win-win structure—securing dependable provide for presidency, enabling sustainable scale for trade, lowering danger for banks, attracting investor confidence, and in the end enhancing entry to high quality healthcare services for residents.
He known as on banks to evolve into improvement companions, policymakers to deal with healthcare as infrastructure funding slightly than expenditure, regulators to proceed balancing security with progress, and institutional buyers to recognise healthcare as a long-term worth sector.
