‘To prevent future health crises public and private sector must support research and development in the health sector’ – CBN Gov

Remarks by Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, at the Premiere of the documentary feature ‘Unmasked: Leadership, Trust, and the Covid-19 pandemic in Nigeria,” which was presented by Mrs. Omobolade Olufolake Ogundero, Branch Controller, CBN Ibadan, at the event held at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, IITA, Ibadan, Oyo State on May 29, 2021)

“…it is important that the public and private sector work to improve access to healthcare, support research and development in the health sector, and find ways to disseminate useful information on healthcare to the general public. On our part, the CBN remains committed to working with all stakeholders in improving access to finance and credit that would support the development of viable healthcare infrastructure in our country.”

I AM indeed delighted to once again participate in the launch of this documentary film, “Unmasked”, following my participation at the movie premiere in Lagos. I would like to commend the extensive work that had been undertaken by the producers of the film Ms. Kadaria Ahmed and Mr. Femi Odugbami in showcasing attention on a very vital aspect that is required for the progress of any society, which is the development of a robust healthcare system that can cater to all Nigerians. In my brief remarks today, I intend to dwell on the important linkage between healthcare and economic growth, and some of the steps we may need to consider in order to ensure that we have a robust healthcare infrastructure that is accessible to majority of Nigerians.

As we are all aware, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in December 2019, brought to the limelight, the vital linkage between public health and economic growth. Nations all across the world with the exception of China witnessed unprecedented declines in growth in the year 2020, due to the rapid spread of the virus, along with the imposition of containment measures that were designed to slow down the spread of the virus.

 In Nigeria, we were faced with both domestic and external spillover effects as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. First, the over 60 percent decline in oil prices in the first half of the year, affected our foreign exchange earnings as well as government revenue. In addition, key sectors, particularly those that were contact facing, such as hospitality, education, transportation, tourism, and trade, witnessed significant declines in growth. A culmination of these factors resulted in our economy falling into a recession in the 2nd quarter of 2020. The crisis brought to the limelight the impact of public health on economic growth, government revenues and unemployment.

Addressing the public health crisis along with the downturn in the economy required strong coordination from both the monetary and fiscal authorities. Thankfully, our joint efforts led to Nigeria’s emergence from the recession by the 4^th quarter of 2020.

Our first objective was to restore stability to the economy by providing assistance to households and businesses that had been severely affected by the pandemic, as well as by the lockdown measures. Measures were put in place by the Central Bank through our intervention programs to support households and businesses in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors. However, we also realized that our recovery efforts would be in vain, if we did not pay considerable attention to improving the capacity of our healthcare system to respond to the crisis, as well as ramping up efforts to build a sustainable healthcare infrastructure that could anticipate and respond adequately to a potential health crisis in the future.

Building a robust healthcare infrastructure was also vital from a security perspective, as some nations had imposed restrictions on the exports of vital medical drugs, as well as the use of drug patents that could help in containing the spread of the pandemic. As a result, we focused our interventions in the health care sector on three areas;

1. Building existing capacity of our healthcare institutions
2. Supporting domestic manufacturing of drugs by businesses, and
3. Providing grants to researchers in the medical field, in order to encourage them to develop breakthrough innovations that would address health challenges faced by Nigerians.

In this regard, we disbursed over N83.9 billion in loans to pharmaceutical companies and healthcare practitioners, which is supporting 26 pharmaceutical and 56 medical projects across the country. We were also able to mobilize key stakeholders in the Nigerian economy through the CACOVID alliance, which led to the provision of over N25bn in relief materials to affected households, and the set-up of 39 isolation centers across the country. These measures helped to expand and strengthen the  existing capacity of our healthcare institutions to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.

We also initiated the Healthcare Sector Research and Development Intervention Grant Scheme, which will aid research on solutions that could address diseases such as COVID-19, and other communicable/non-communicable diseases. So far 5 major healthcare related research projects are being financed under this initiative.

Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, while these interventions have helped to improve our capacity to respond to the crisis, we cannot afford to rest on our oars as more work needs to be done to build a more sustainable healthcare infrastructure in our country.

I would also like to call attention to the immense potential of our creative industries in drawing awareness, as well as  attention to issues confronting society through the use of modern digital tools. The movie “Unmasked” reflects part of these efforts, in showcasing the impact of COVID-19 on our healthcare system, with a view towards encouraging public and private sector stakeholders to develop innovative ways to improve the capacity of our healthcare institutions. 

The Central Bank of Nigeria working with the Bankers Committee has put in place measures to support the growth of the creative industries in Nigeria. Areas of interest in the creative sector include Movies, Music, Information Technology(IT), and Fashion. As a result, the Bankers Committee intends to support the development of a creative industry park across three cities in Nigeria, Lagos, Kano, and Port-Harcourt. Each park will house well-equipped training facilities and studios, supporting skills acquisition for over 200,000 Nigerians. Participants will acquire world-class skills in producing relevant software; music and movie content, as well as fashion design and production. So far close to N25bn has been earmarked by the Bankers Committee, and the National Theatre Iganmu, Lagos is expected to serve as the pilot phase for the program. We believe we can leverage these creative centers in enabling young talented Nigerians to  develop high quality movies and documentaries, which can be showcased to a domestic and global audience.

Conclusion

Let me conclude my remarks by once again thanking the organizers of this event for their efforts in calling our attention on the need to build a more healthy and robust healthcare infrastructure that could cater to the vast majority of Nigerians. As I noted, there is a strong linkage between health care and economic growth as evidenced by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Nigeria and indeed the world.

In order to prevent future health crises that could have spillover effects on our economy, it is important that the public and private sector work to improve access to healthcare, support research and development in the health sector and find ways to disseminate useful information on healthcare to the general public. On our part, the CBN remains committed to working with all stakeholders in improving access to finance and credit that would support the development of viable healthcare infrastructure in our country.