The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has lamented what it described as inequality in Nigeria’s Primary Health Care system (PHC).
Representative of UNICEF Nigeria, Eduardo Celades Blanco, stated this, yesterday, in Abuja.
Blanco said Nigeria had not been able to bridge the disparities between the North and South, poor and rich, hence the inequity.
He said there was a need to increase the allocation of resources to the country’s overall health budget.
According to him, this is possible by increasing the proportion of the government general expenditure to, at least, 10 per cent, by 2025 and 12 per cent by 2030, to fast-track the achievement of SDG3.
He called on the country to redesign the flow of resources in its health system to increase the operational cost at the PHC level.
He, however, said the poor performance of the country’s PHC system could not be explained by inadequate investments.
“It is more of a question of efficiency and sustainability of efforts over time, hence there is a sense of urgency.”
He said the urgency was needed to adopt a performance-based approach to health financing for improved PHC functions and outcomes, especially at decentralised levels. He stressed the need for more value for money, leveraging strategic purchasing to increase both programmatic and cost efficiency, to rebuild trust for more investments in health.
Blanco said the country needed to strengthen the public financial management system to address inefficiencies.
This can be achieved by maximising spending levels within budgets, focusing on increased spending at council and/or facility level for improving PHC services.
Meanwhile, he said UNICEF would continue to support governments, at all levels, to improve PHC financing, performance and outcomes through some initiatives.
Such initiatives include PHC leadership challenge to catalyse increased investment by state governments while strengthening leadership and accountability for results.