President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has taken a strong step to ensure that 10% of the Nigerian budget is allocated to health.
By Deborah Hassan
365Daily – The Special Adviser on Health to President Bola Tinubu, Dr. Salma Ibrahim-Anas, has revealed that the government is working towards increasing Nigeria’s annual budgetary allocation to the health sector by 10 per cent.
She made this disclosure on Tuesday during the GateField Health Summit in Abuja.
Dr. Salma said: “President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has taken a strong step to ensure that 10% of the Nigerian budget is allocated to health. This is to improve the health outcome of Nigeria,” she said, adding that the president is a strong advocate on health issues and ”committed to forging a formidable health for our citizens.”
The GateField summit promotes advocacy for more tax on sugar-sweetened beverages to fund Nigeria’s debilitating health care system. It amplified the long-term effects of sugar-sweetened beverages intake on Nigerians and posits that manufacturers of sweetened beverages should be taxed to generate revenue for citizens who suffer from diseases like diabetes, cancer, heart diseases, and other non-communicable diseases that are majorly caused by the intake of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB).
Over 13 million Nigerians are living with diabetes and 12 million with pre-diabetes in the country, hence, the movement to tax and caution companies in production of SSB to create a major impact on the health sector and prevent the overflow of more health cases in the future cannot be over-emphasised.