Basic Health Care Provision Fund: A Slow Start to a Long Journey
It is a palpable cause for concern that implementation guidelines for BHCPF do little to incentivize and reward the commitment of states to improved health sector funding and enhanced health care access.
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Signing of the National Health Bill into an Act at the twilight of the President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration in 2014 was greeted with euphoria largely because it paved the way for implementation of the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF). The euphoria was understandable because the BHCPF was envisaged to play a pivotal role in transforming Nigeria’s unenviable health financing landscape characterized by suboptimal public investment as Nigeria government spends less than one percent of the country’s GDP on health which is one of the lowest public investment in health in the world. The suboptimal government investment in health, not surprisingly, leads to low coverage of financial prot