Due to the dwindling structure of providing accessible service in the Healthcare sector, Nigeria has been rated as one of the countries noted with the poor health system services in Africa.
A released report on the sustainability index on Tuesday, highlight specific facts, ranking Nigeria 14th with a total of 41 scores out of 18 African counties with South Africa ranking first with 63 scores.
Tunisia came second with 58, Morocco trailed behind scoring 55, while Democratic Republic of Congo came last with 38 scores.
Future Proofing Healthcare Initiative launched the Africa Sustainability Index at the 2021 Africa Health Agenda International Conference (AHAIC), also revealed that Nigeria ranked last in maternal mortality, infant vaccination and neonatal mortality.
Moreover, the country ranked 17th on Births attended by skilled health staff and access to effective treatment of tuberculosis, and ranked first in laboratory quality.
The index report was designed to enable data down decision making for health and revealed correlations between economic strength and health. System sustainability showed that countries with good access scores to services do not always have similar scores for the quality of health services provided.
In addition, the report revealed that Nigeria did not perform unwell in responding to global health threat, leading the continent in its Covid 19 response stringency and treating tuberculosis cases for multiple drug resistance.
“Nigerians are also the most likely in Africa to describe assessing medical services as ‘easy’ which reflects few barriers in treatment.”
The report also encourages improvement in terms of health status of the Nigerian population, mortality rates from communicable diseases such as waterborne illness and diarrhoea disease, and high incidence of viral hepatitis and malaria.
As well, it recommended that health outcomes could be improved by prioritizing neonatal care, and noted that there were deficits in availability of health care personnel combined with allied factors such as poor access to clean water, political instability and adult gender literacy gaps which accentuate the problems of ecosystem.
Chief Executive Officer of Amrefand Africa Sustainability Index Panelist, Githinij Gitahi, said; “Sustainable healthcare is a key element on the journey towards UHC and will impact millions of lives in Africa”.
Lolo Ijeoma Njoku reporting, Obinwannem News
