Mkpoikana Udoma
Port Harcourt — Nigeria has committed an additional $200 million in its 2025 national budget to sustain critical health programs as part of a major shift towards domestic funding and health sector resilience, the Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr. Iziaq Adekunle Salako, has announced.
Speaking at the 15th BRICS Health Ministers’ Meeting in Brasilia, Brazil, Salako described the investment as a strategic response to the decline in Official Development Assistance, ODA, signaling Nigeria’s intent to boost self-reliance and build a more secure and sustainable health system.
He said, “As global aid flows shrink, we are increasing domestic resource mobilization to ensure continuity and expansion of key programs for AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria. This is not just about plugging funding gaps, it is about asserting ownership of our health future.”
The Minister emphasized Nigeria’s broader investment agenda under the Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative, the operational framework for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda.
Key priorities, according to him, include unlocking the healthcare value chain, improving pharmaceutical and diagnostic production, and digitizing the health ecosystem.
“We are promoting pooled procurement mechanisms, revitalizing primary healthcare, and scaling up the use of digital health and artificial intelligence. This is a transformative agenda aimed at improving efficiency and access across the system.”
In a standout achievement, Salako revealed that Nigeria’s recent HPV vaccination campaign reached over 14 million girls aged 9 to 14 by May 2025, the highest number recorded globally in a single round.
Salako also pitched for deeper South-South partnerships with BRICS nations in pharmaceutical innovation, phytomedicine development, and academic exchanges, noting that “these challenges call for stronger South-South cooperation and global solidarity to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals.”
To further global collaboration, he announced Nigeria’s plan to host the next high-level ministerial conference on antimicrobial resistance in Abuja in June 2026.
The Minister stressed the importance of addressing broader social determinants of health and non-communicable disease risk factors.
“We are introducing forward-looking policies to address modifiable risk factors for NCDs and integrating health into our broader economic strategy,” he said.
Dr. Salako concluded with a call for united global action: “Our collective efforts will serve as an impetus to achieve SDG Goal 3, ensuring healthy lives and promoting well-being for all, without leaving anyone behind. In the context of our shared humanity, we must act together. Humanity is one.”
Chaired by Brazil, the meeting brought together health ministers and senior officials from the BRICS nations, Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, to chart a path toward resilient and inclusive health systems amid mounting global uncertainties.
