Crossing the quality chasm: Nigeria’s long walk to universal health coverage
In a recently published blog, my friend Dr Abiodun Awosusi narrated this very touching story: “I walked into the paediatric unit of a teaching hospital in Nigeria a few years ago to review a patient. On the first bed was a lifeless child. He was brought in dead a few minutes earlier by his parents. His mother, “Bisi”, wept uncontrollably. While in tears, she recounted how difficult it was for them to borrow money to get to the hospital. Although they got some money from a chief in the community, the two-year-old baby died before they got to the hospital”. Many households such as this one have been pushed into poverty, debt, and financial hardship as a result of seeking health care. In Nigeria, data from the 2017 National Health…