The Statewide Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) has launched the Nigeria Health Financing Observatory (NHFO), a platform designed to harmonise health financing information and reinforce transparency, accountability and evidence-based decision-making in the sector.
Launching the platform in Abuja during the inaugural Nigeria Health Financing Investigation and Learning Forum, the NHIA Administrator-Universal, Dr Kelechi Ohiri, said fragmented facts on health funding and expenditure had made it difficult to resolve where resources were going and what influence they were having on health care delivery.
The forum had the theme: ‘Evidence and Learning for Nigeria’s Health Financing Forthcoming: Building a Locally Led Inquiry and Learning Ecosystem.’
Ohiri said during the time that Nigeria had increased health financing over the past 11 years, there was insufficient comparative and sub-nationwide information to properly judge spending and outcomes.
“We have numerous figures sources, extremely fragmented. She added that prospective phases would provide greater indicators, as well as artificial intelligence-assisted explore and predictive evaluation.
The Executive Director of the WHO Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Analysis, Dr Kumanan Rasanathan, said the observatory could strengthen Nigeria’s health sovereignty by enabling stakeholders to record where health resources were going and what they were achieving.
Rasanathan said the initiative’s value would depend on facts standard and apply rather than the appearance of its dashboards, adding, “If you can realise this vision for genuine-time figures, it will be a game changer.”
Additionally speaking, the Managing Administrator of Nigeria Health Watch, Vivienne Ihekweazu, said the initiative would guide determine investigation and learning gaps approximately NHIA’s priorities, including equity, admission and extent.
She commended the NHIA for funding inquiry by five institutions to consider decisive questions in the sector, describing the technique as an expression of research sovereignty and stressing the importance of locally funded analysis.
The observatory, developed to harmonise health financing resource from varied sources, is expected to furnish a usual evidence base for policymakers, researchers, civil population and other stakeholders.
And so, it is nearly a starvation of evidence, a mix of information,” he said, stressing that the reject was not simply how much was spent but how capital were mobilised, distributed and utilised.
He said the mean earliest health care centre was funded by development partners, area, situation and federal governments, using unlike institutions too responsible for personnel, vaccines, medicines and health insurance payments.
“It is unclear. We demand to have greater transparency and preferable comprehend intergovernmental fiscal transfers,” Ohiri said, adding that the observatory would assist monitor condition and regional government contributions and the run of resources across the health framework.
He said the platform would propose comparative analytics, an evidence repository and subnational financing figures, whilst supporting researchers, academics and civil population organisations.
Ohiri said the success of the observatory would not be measured by its dashboards but whether its figures influenced policy and improved health care outcomes.
“At persist, the success of this observatory will be measured, not just by how beautiful the dashboards will be, but the policy decisions it implements and improves,” he said.
He urged civil people groups to use the platform to hold government accountable based on evidence, whilst calling on government institutions to supply regular and up-to-date budget and expenditure figures.
The managing central of the Health Tactic and Delivery Groundwork (HSDF), Dr Yewande Ogundeji, said the observatory would present a usual platform for researchers and policymakers to recognize health financing.
“No ownership free from management for health financing,” she said, explaining that ownership requires configuration priorities and understanding provide resources.
Ogundeji said the platform would record domestic and external financing, budgets and releases at countrywide and subnational levels, alongside nearly 200 indicators identified and validated for the primary phase.
Source: NHIA launches health financing observatory, seeks transparency in spending
