Nigeria’s Response to Covid-19

By Mustapha Ndajiwo, November 2020 Introduction The unprecedented coronavirus pandemic has altered the global system in myriad ways, and a major concern has been the preparedness and response to the pandemic by African countries. Early predictions in Africa put the expected death toll at 300,000 , with significant risk for increased poverty. However, while the economic impact of the pandemic as well as the exacerbated impact due to economic lockdowns are apparent, the death rates in Africa remain low and have puzzled scientists all over the world; at the end of September 2020, only 3.5% of the reported global Covid-19 deaths occurred in Africa. The predictions were hinged on concerns relating to overstretched and underfunded health sytems . Nigeria’s covid related deaths are very low. At the end of August 2020, Covid-19 related deaths were still around 1000. This may be attributable to the low testing capacity in the country. African countries remain economically challenged by the pandemic. Nigeria does not only suffer from the deleterious impact of the virus, but also from the decline in global oil prices due its huge reliance on oil revenue. This has affected its annual budget and has seen it take measures to alleviate the negative impact on the economy. According to a World Health Organization’s (WHO) Joint External Evaluation on International Health Response in 2017, to assess countries’ capacity to prevent, detect and respond to public health risks such as Covid-19, Nigeria scored poorly on the indicators related to prevention and response. This means that the country is not well-equipped to tackle the crisis. This raises questions about the quality of public health in the country and how it has been funded among other things. Nigeria’s 2020 annual health budget is 4.16% less than the 15% recommended and agreed at the Abuja Declaration . Poor allocation of funds to public health is undoubtedly one of the major reasons a country as rich in resources as Nigeria r