The NHA documents and characterizes the flow of resources in a country’s health sector. Policy makers and administrators use the NHA to learn from past expenditure and improve planning and allocation of resources throughout the system, thereby increasing efficiency and accountability. A better understanding of health spending is essential and allows countries to improve their systems, with the ultimate goal of making them equitable and better serve the people. Health accounts therefore, can help to protect people from catastrophic health bills and reduce inequalities in health. They are seen as an essential step in creating a universal health coverage (UHC) system (WHO, 2011). In Nigeria, the NHA has been a major undertaking by the Ministry of Health with the first NHA conducted in 1998. The NHA results provide information on domestic and external resource mobilization, as well as inform health policy processes and public finance management frameworks in Nigeria. The 2017 NHA is the most recent and uses actual health expenditures incurred during the 2017 calendar year (from 1st January to 31st December). Given Nigeria’s commitment to attaining UHC, tracking of health resources through the NHA is essential to ensure efficient and equitable distribution of the resources.
The full report can be downloaded using the link below