{"id":67397,"date":"2025-06-05T11:01:24","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T11:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=67397"},"modified":"2025-06-05T11:01:24","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T11:01:24","slug":"nigerias-health-budget-too-small-needs-urgent-boost-bill-gates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/06\/05\/nigerias-health-budget-too-small-needs-urgent-boost-bill-gates\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigeria\u2019s Health Budget Too Small, Needs Urgent Boost -Bill Gates"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Samuel Adeola<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Billionaire philanthropist and Co-Chair of the Bill &amp; Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, has criticized the Nigerian government for its low investment in healthcare, warning that the country\u2019s current budget is inadequate to address critical health challenges such as high maternal and child mortality rates.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking at a media roundtable in Lagos on Wednesday ahead of the Gates Foundation\u2019s first-ever Goalkeepers event in Nigeria, Gates said: \u201cThe amount of money Nigeria spends on healthcare is very, very small. I don\u2019t know why you would expect maternal mortality to decline under such conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He stressed that quality maternal care, including access to C-sections, depends on significant investment in health infrastructure, something countries like India have successfully implemented.<\/p>\n<p>Despite a \u20a6300 billion increase in Nigeria\u2019s 2025 health budget, raising the total to \u20a62.48 trillion or 5.18% of the national budget; Gates said the figure remains far too low.<\/p>\n<p>Gates revealed he had discussed the issue with President Bola Tinubu, urging a stronger commitment to health funding despite competing national priorities.<\/p>\n<p>He also expressed concern over declining global health aid, particularly cuts from the U.S., UK, and Germany, which he said will inevitably lead to more deaths from HIV, malaria, and maternal complications.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s nobody who can match that U.S. government money,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ll have more deaths, and it\u2019s painful because that funding was making a real difference.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While the Gates Foundation continues to increase its spending annually, Gates noted that its resources are limited.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy money is not extra money. If others disappear, I\u2019ll still spend my money, but it\u2019s the same amount,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>He concluded by reaffirming his commitment to Africa, stating that most of his pledged $200 billion donation over the next 20 years will be directed toward the continent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Samuel Adeola &nbsp; Billionaire philanthropist and Co-Chair of the Bill &amp; Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, has criticized the Nigerian government for its low investment in healthcare, warning that the country\u2019s current budget is inadequate to address critical health challenges such as high maternal and child mortality rates. Speaking at a media roundtable in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":67398,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[184,249],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-world-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67397"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67397\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67399,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67397\/revisions\/67399"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}