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Why Nigeria?

Nigeria is a federal constitutional republic consisting of 36 states and a population of 150 million, making it the most populous country in Africa. Of all the African countries, it has the highest number of doctors and it is also one of the wealthiest. However in 2000, the WHO ranked Nigeria 187 out of 190 of the worst health care systems in the world. Nigeria has the potential and the ability to provide the best health care in Africa; all it needs is health infrastructure, updated health policy, and effective public health intervention.

Nigeria’s Failing Health Care System

Each year worldwide, 500,000 women die due to complications from childbirth. Of these, 10% come from Nigeria, where, for every woman who dies in childbirth, another 30 suffer debilitating complications and chronic ill health. The infant mortality rate mirrors the maternal statistics, with 71 neonatal deaths per 1000 live births. In 2000, NGOs and private foundations accounted for almost 90% of Nigeria’s health care spending, underscoring the collapse of the state health system. While local and international NGOs provide many low-cost maternal and child health clinics, these clinics are burdened by completely ineffective paper-based “health information management systems”.  Because of this, a typical data point is recorded 3-4 times and manually summarized monthly or quarterly, a process that can take weeks to complete. Unfortunately, if the clinic is not affiliated with a  research hospital or an external funder, clinical data may not exist at all. Also, it is impossible for healthcare workers to use data from previous visits to treat returning patients.  The lack of an Health Management Information Systems is a major contributor to Nigeria’s failing healthcare system