Achieving Universal Health Coverage in Nigeria: Moving Beyond Annual Celebrations to Concrete Address of the Challenges

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), universal health coverage (UHC) is the organization of health‐care systems in a way that provides a specific health‐care benefit package to all members of a defined population, through provision of financial risk protection in the course of accessing necessary health‐care services. Since the adoption of the concept of UHC by the World Health Assembly in the year 2005, followed by its adoption in the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Agenda as the eighth target of SDG 3, greater global attention is now focused on the achievement of UHC. While the successes recorded so far vary in different countries and continents, the case of Nigeria remains very pathetic. Nigeria's main strategic mechanism for achieving UHC is her National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), which is a contributory social health insurance scheme. Since the formal launch of the NHIS on June 6, 2005, not more than 4percent of Nigeria's population has been covered by the scheme. This article is therefore aimed at reviewing Nigeria's progress toward UHC, with particular emphasis on its challenges, and with some recommendations proffered on how Nigeria can more realistically achieve UHC.