Health reforms should show results, save lives — NHIA boss

The Director-General of the National Health Insurance Authority, Dr Kelechi Ohiri, has said health innovations must translate into measurable improvements in Nigerians’ lives, warning that policies and technology alone cannot address the country’s healthcare challenges without effective implementation.

Ohiri said this on Thursday at the 2026 Future of Health Conference organised by Nigeria Health Watch in Abuja, where he highlighted government interventions that have enabled thousands of women to access emergency childbirth care without upfront payments.

He disclosed that about “19,000 women had benefited from the National Health Insurance Authority’s emergency obstetric care programme in the past 18 months, while approximately 300 hospitals had been accredited to provide treatment under the initiative.”

The programme allows women experiencing complications during childbirth to receive treatment without making initial payments, with the NHIA financing the cost of care.

Ohiri said the intervention was designed to prevent avoidable deaths caused by delays in accessing emergency treatment, particularly when families struggle to raise money for hospital deposits.

“One of the most inequitable moments in the healthcare journey is when complications arise,” he said, describing situations where women in labour were forced to wait for their relatives to source funds before receiving urgent medical attention.

He said the authority had also worked with partners to provide treatment for obstetric fistula, with about 6,000 women benefiting from the intervention.

According to him, the programmes demonstrate how changes in healthcare financing can remove barriers to treatment and improve outcomes for vulnerable Nigerians.

“Our success will not be measured by the number of speeches we deliver or the policies we announce. It will be measured by real improvements in people’s lives,” Ohiri said.

He argued that Nigeria needed to move beyond conventional approaches to healthcare delivery and financing, particularly as changes in the global health landscape exposed the risks of relying heavily on external funding.

“The future arrived much faster than anticipated. Many countries were left stranded because they were not adequately prepared,” he said, calling for greater domestic ownership of health priorities and sustainable financing mechanisms.

Ohiri said the Nigerian Health Sector Reform Investment Initiative was designed around four pillars: governance, service delivery, health financing and health security.

He explained that the framework sought to strengthen coordination among governments and health sector stakeholders, improve access to healthcare, address financing constraints and prepare the country for future public health emergencies.

The NHIA chief noted that Nigeria faced the combined burden of infectious diseases, maternal mortality and rising non-communicable diseases, making it necessary to develop innovations suited to the country’s specific circumstances.

He disclosed that the authority was working with some state governments to integrate services into health insurance schemes, with approximately 70,000 people enrolled through the approach.

He said the model was intended to provide more comprehensive care rather than treating patients as isolated cases based on particular diseases or age groups.

Ohiri also emphasised the importance of supporting local research and ensuring that promising innovations were assessed, funded and expanded beyond pilot projects.

He said the NHIA had partnered with Nigeria Health Watch to support five independent researchers selected through a competitive process to develop solutions to health system challenges.

He added that the authority had established a health technology assessment committee to evaluate medicines, technologies and other interventions before decisions were made on their adoption and funding.

According to him, the process would help the government identify innovations that offered the greatest benefits to Nigerians while providing a clearer pathway for developers seeking to introduce new solutions.

On primary healthcare, Ohiri said the NHIA was adopting a balanced scorecard to assess facilities based on governance, community participation, clinical quality, data management and financial accountability.

He said frontline health workers needed managerial, administrative and financial skills, alongside clinical expertise, to operate healthcare facilities effectively.

Earlier, the Managing Director of Nigeria Health Watch, Vivianne Ihekweazu, said the Future of Health Conference, which began in 2016, had provided a platform for discussions on universal health coverage, healthcare financing, technology and private-sector participation.

She said innovations such as artificial intelligence and digital health tools needed to be developed and applied in ways that addressed Nigeria’s specific healthcare challenges.

At a panel session on innovations that save lives, the Senior Adviser to the Director-General of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention on global HIV, strategic partnerships and health security, Dr Erasmus Morah, said scientific advances alone could not improve health outcomes without political commitment and community participation.

Morah cited Nigeria’s HIV response, saying treatment coverage had increased from about 33 per cent in 2017 to approximately 85 to 86 per cent, partly following improvements in the data used to estimate the number of people living with HIV.

“Innovation by itself will not move the needle. We need science, we need politics, and we need the community in between,” he said.

“Science without politics is powerless. Politics without science is dangerous.”

Molecular geneticist Dr Ify Aniebo also highlighted the use of genomic research, artificial intelligence and machine learning to track malaria parasite drug resistance and help policymakers make evidence-based decisions.

She said her team had reduced the cost of sequencing a malaria parasite sample from about $150 to $20 and developed digital tools to make research findings more accessible to policymakers.

Aniebo said the approach could help authorities identify emerging drug-resistance patterns and design targeted interventions.

Another presenter, Ikechukwu Anoke of Zuri Health, called for greater investment in African-led innovations, highlighting the potential of technology-enabled healthcare and community-based screening to expand access to services in underserved areas.

The conference brought together health sector leaders, researchers, innovators and development partners to examine how locally relevant solutions could be developed, financed and scaled to improve healthcare delivery and outcomes.