Stakeholders Set to Hold Policy Dialogue on Nigerian Health System

Against the backdrop of how countries including Nigeria were particularly affected and caught unprepared for a pandemic of the speed and scale witnessed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the leading advocacy health platform, Nigeria Health Watch, is set to host a health security forum. 

Themed, “Decentralising Health Security, Lessons from COVID-19,” the forum will take place on the 14th of July 2022 in Abuja, Nigeria, and will bring together stakeholders from across the national and subnational level, the private sector, development partners/donors, and civil society organizations.

COVID-19 has had wide-ranging health and socioeconomic impact on societies globally, setting back some of the efforts and health gains as countries continue on their path towards achieving universal health coverage (UHC).

Speaking about the forum, Managing Director, Nigeria Health Watch, Vivianne Ihekweazu, said: “We cannot overlook the fact that the health sector in Nigeria has been historically underfunded. The COVID-19 pandemic revealed how much more work and investments need to be made, to strengthen our health system, enabling the country to be better prepared to respond to future epidemic outbreaks. Vulnerable and marginalized populations were hit particularly hard by the pandemic and pre-existing inequalities were further exacerbated. We are hosting this health security policy dialogue because we need to ensure that the lessons learnt during the COVID-19 pandemic are applied to future epidemic outbreaks and the strengthening of the country’s health security architecture becomes a national priority”.