HEALTH EXPENDITURE, IMMUNIZATION AND HEALTH STATUS IN NIGERIA

This study examined the impact of health expenditure, immunization on health status in Nigeria with the objectives of evaluating the relationship between government’s health expenditure on immunization and infant mortality in Nigeria; examining the effect of foreign agencies’ health expenditure on immunization and life expectancy in Nigeria and investigating the relationship between government’s expenditure on immunization and maternal mortality in Nigeria. In order to achieve these objectives, three econometric models were estimated using the Error Correction Mechanism. The variables included were percentage coverage of immunized children (PIC), Official development assistance of multinational (ODM), Net Official inflow of WHO on communicable diseases (UDP), Net official inflow of UNCEF on vaccine preventable diseases and communicable diseases control (UCF), Public health expenditure to GDP (PDP) and Physicians (per 1000 population) (PHYS) as the independent variables while Three major health status indicators- infant mortality rate (IMR), Life expectancy at birth (LFX), Maternal mortality (MAM) were the dependent variables. Annual time series data collected from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Statistical Bulletin and the World Development Indicators (WDI) were used, and the ADF test was employed in testing for unit root of the variables, which revealed that all the variables were stationary at the first difference 1(1) while the Johansen co-integration result revealed that Nigeria’s health statuses were cointegrated with the explanatory variables. The regression result of the first model showed that PIC, ODM and PYS have an inverse relationship with, and significant impact on infant mortality rate in Nigeria while PDP has direct relationship with, and significant impact on infant mortality rate. UNDP has direct relationship with, but insignificant impact on infant mortality rate while UCF has an indirect relationship with, and insignificant impact on infant mortality rate in the country. From the regression results obtained from the second model, ODM, PDP and UDP have direct relationship with, and significant impact on Nigeria’s life expectancy while PYS has an inverse relationship with, and significant impact on life expectancy. Finally, the third model estimation showed that ODM, PDP and PYS have inverse impact on maternal mortality rate while PIC, UDP and UCF have direct impact on maternal mortality rate in Nigeria. The study further revealed that government expenditure on immunization does not reduce the number of infant deaths in the country. However, government expenditure on health stemmed maternal mortality, and promoted life expectancy while foreign agency health expenditure on immunization stems infant mortality and maternal mortality and improved life expectancy in the country. In light of the above, the study made the following recommendations; that foreign agencies should increase their expenditure on immunization in order to increase percentage coverage of immunized children and there is need for government to increase, train and retraining of healthcare personnel most especially the physicians in the country in order to improve Nigerian health status.