Trending
Get The Brief
For Doctors

The policy, funding and evidence shaping your practice

Written for clinicians rather than patients. Health financing and donor dependency, workforce and brain drain, service delivery models that work, regulation, and the research that changes what you prescribe. What is happening upstream of your consulting room, and what it means downstream of it.

Browse all articles Partner with HubPharm

Medically reviewed · For registered health professionals · Available in 8 languages

5 to 6%

Of national spending goes to health in Nigeria, leaving HIV, malaria and nutrition programmes heavily dependent on donors and exposed when that funding pauses.

Over 90%

Of diagnosed people living with HIV in Nigeria now receive treatment, an outcome credited in large part to differentiated service delivery models adopted since 2019.

2 million

People remain food insecure in Borno State alone, with child malnutrition above emergency thresholds across the north east as feeding clinics close.

What this section covers

Most of HealthCoach is written for patients. This section is not. It carries the health systems reporting, regulatory developments and clinical research that affect how you practise: what is being funded, who is leaving, which delivery models are producing outcomes, and what the evidence base has shifted on.

Looking for something else? Health jobs and career routes · Patient-facing condition guides · Grants and fellowships

Start here

Health systems, financing and the workforce.

US aid freeze and its impact on Nigerian health programmes
Health financing

US Aid Freeze Sparks Humanitarian Crisis in Nigeria

Paused PEPFAR and donor funding for HIV, malaria and nutrition has consequences that land in clinics, not committee rooms. Treatment interruptions for patients on subsidised medicines, WFP feeding clinics closing in Borno and Yobe, and a health system where donors carry what a 5 to 6 percent budget allocation cannot.

Medically reviewed · August 25, 2025

More for clinicians

Differentiated service delivery for HIV care
Service delivery
Differentiated Service Delivery Transforms HIV Care in Rivers State
August 10, 2023
NMA on organ transplant legislation
Regulation and ethics
NMA Calls for Legislative Overhaul to Safeguard Organ Transplants
December 19, 2023
Health workforce and brain drain in Nigeria
Workforce
Federal Government Pledges to Fortify Health Workforce Amidst Rising Brain Drain
November 30, 2023
Climate change and maternal health
Maternal health
Climate Change Poses Severe Threat to Pregnant Women and Children
November 22, 2023
View all articles →

Evidence and practice

Research findings, therapeutics and delivery tools.

Tirzepatide versus semaglutide research
Therapeutics

Tirzepatide vs Semaglutide: What the Trial Data Showed

22 RCTs, nearly 18,500 patients with type 2 diabetes. Greater weight loss and a 2 percent larger HbA1c reduction, against more GI side effects at higher doses.

Read →
Digital toolkit for maternal health
Digital health

Digital Toolkit for Improved Maternal Health

Remote monitoring, telehealth and adherence tools for antenatal and postpartum care, and where they complement rather than replace clinic contact.

Read →
Generic versus brand-name medications
Prescribing

Generic vs Brand-Name Medications: The Evidence

Bioequivalence standards, NAFDAC and FDA scrutiny, and why generics carry about 90 percent of prescriptions at roughly 20 percent of cost.

Read →
Diabetes in young adults
Clinical management

Managing Diabetes in Young Adults

Earlier onset, longer disease duration and a complication burden that arrives in a patient's most economically active years.

Read →

What this means at the bedside

Health systems reporting is only useful if it changes something in your practice. Six translations from the coverage on this page.

Anticipate treatment interruption

When donor funding pauses, patients on subsidised antiretrovirals and antimalarials feel it first. Ask directly about supply and cost at each review rather than assuming continuity.

Differentiated delivery works

Community and facility-based DSD models moved Nigeria past 90 percent treatment coverage among diagnosed patients. The principle generalises to any stable chronic condition.

Prescribe generics with confidence

Bioequivalence is a regulatory requirement, not a marketing claim. Cost is the most common reason patients silently stop treatment, and this is the cheapest fix available to you.

Document your consent process

With organ donation and transplantation under legislative scrutiny, contemporaneous documentation of consent and next-of-kin discussion protects both patient and clinician.

Screen for climate-linked risk

Heat exposure, displacement and food insecurity now sit behind preterm birth, low birthweight and rising cholera, malaria and dengue presentations. Ask about them in antenatal histories.

Know where your patient gets medicines

Counterfeit and substandard products, and unaffordable ones, both end in the same place: an untreated patient with a prescription in their pocket. Ask where they fill it.

More reading

Clinical management and advocacy.

Geriatrics

Effective Strategies for Managing Pain in the Elderly

Read → Musculoskeletal

Back Pain Management: Strategies for Relief and Prevention

Read → Advocacy

First Lady Advocates for Mental Health Awareness on World Mental Health Day

Read →
Refer a patient

Adherence support for the patients you cannot follow up

HubPharm Africa is a tech-enabled specialty pharmacy and coordinated care platform. We dispense, deliver and follow up on chronic medication, and report adherence back. If a patient of yours is defaulting on cost, distance or forgetfulness, refer them and we will close that loop.

Refer a patient
For hospitals and HMOs

Partner with HubPharm

We work with hospitals, clinics and HMOs on medication supply, chronic care coordination and adherence programmes. If your institution is carrying a chronic care load without a dispensing and follow-up partner, let us talk.

Explore partnership

Clinicians can also reach our pharmacists directly for interaction checks, supply queries and formulary alternatives.

Get The HealthCoach Brief

Health systems reporting, research and opportunities across Africa, straight to your inbox each week.

This section is written for registered health professionals and is provided for information and continuing education only. It is not clinical guidance, does not establish a standard of care, and should not replace current national treatment guidelines, your professional judgement or your institution's protocols. Research summarised here may include findings presented at conference and not yet peer reviewed, and prescribing decisions should always be checked against the current approved product information and national formulary. Patients seeking medical advice should consult a qualified doctor or pharmacist directly.