Nigeria: Health experts have urged the Federal Government to move beyond policy declarations and take urgent, life-saving action to prevent premature deaths and strengthen Nigeria’s weak health system.
Speaking at the 2025 Gatefield Health Summit in Abuja on Wednesday 22 October 2025, advocates, researchers and policymakers called for subsidies on essential drugs, expansion of health insurance, and incentives for local pharmaceutical production.
Gatefield Chief Executive Officer, Adewumi Emoruwa, said Nigeria’s declining life expectancy, now at just 54 years reflects deep structural failures.
“At 27, the average Nigerian is already halfway through life. In Europe, that midpoint is around 43. We are dying young not because we are African, but because our health systems are fragile and underfunded,” he said.
Emoruwa identified poor food quality, antimicrobial resistance, chronic underfunding, recurrent disease outbreaks and high maternal mortality as major causes of early deaths.
He warned that excessive sugar and salt in processed foods were fueling non-communicable diseases such as diabetes and hypertension.
“We are feeding our children diabetes,” he said, citing a Swiss lab report that found six grams of sugar in Nigerian baby cereal, while the same product in Europe had none.
On antimicrobial resistance, he blamed weak governance and misuse of antibiotics, warning that AMR could kill up to 10 million Africans by 2050.
Noting that Nigeria spends just five dollars per citizen annually on health, compared to Kenya’s 66 and Europe’s 4,500, he said, “When a country spends so little on health, people die at 54, an age they should still be raising families”.
Emoruwa decried cuts in family planning budgets by 97 percent, describing it as tragic, and said 75,000 women died in childbirth in 2023 equals the of wiping out the population of Monaco every year.
Dr. Niti Pall, President-elect of the International Diabetes Federation, said the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the vulnerability of people with chronic illnesses.
“If we want true health resilience, we must prioritize chronic diseases,” she said.
Society for Family Health Managing Director, Dr. Omokhudu Idogho, represented by Dr. Anthony Nwala, said donor funding was shrinking, urging domestic innovation and sustainability.
“Through SFH Access, affordable medicines for hypertension and diabetes are now available for as low as one dollar per month,” he said.
Other speakers urged urgent reforms to improve local drug production, insurance coverage and preventive care, warning that without action, millions of Nigerians would continue to die young.
