By Gloria Fraser, MFR
Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has raised important questions about Nigeria’s five-year health cooperation agreement with the United States, asking Nigerians to examine what was agreed on health data, pathogen samples, regulatory authority and Nigeria’s financial obligations.
These questions deserve factual answers, not political exchanges.
Nigeria signed the agreement in December 2025 to strengthen primary healthcare, disease surveillance, laboratories, medicines, health workers and programmes addressing HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and maternal and child health. The United States intends to provide approximately US$2.1 billion, while Nigeria is expected to increase domestic health expenditure by nearly US$3 billion over five years.
Can Nigerian pathogen samples leave the country? Yes, potentially—but not automatically. The MoU provides for negotiation of a specimen-sharing arrangement covering pathogens with epidemic potential and related information, including genetic-sequence data. Importantly, approval is to be given by Nigeria’s Data and Specimen Governance Committee on a case-by-case basis.
That safeguard matters, but Nigeria should go further. No biological material should leave the country without a clearly defined public-health or scientific purpose, Nigerian authorisation, adequate security and appropriate benefit-sharing where Nigerian resources contribute to commercially valuable vaccines, diagnostics or medicines.
What about Nigerians’ medical data? The agreement envisages regulated data access for monitoring, accountability and auditing, while stating that data-sharing arrangements should comply with relevant laws governing personally identifiable information and respect ownership, access and hosting requirements. Nigeria must nevertheless ensure that the National Health Act and Nigeria Data Protection Act remain paramount and that personally identifiable patient information is never treated as an unrestricted commodity.
Atiku also asks whether NAFDAC retains its regulatory authority. The available MoU does not state that NAFDAC surrenders its regulatory powers. It instead refers to the NAFDAC–U.S. FDA Mutual Recognition Framework and Nigeria’s own Regulatory Directive on Reliance to accelerate evaluation of relevant products. That distinction is important. Nevertheless, the Federal Government should clarify publicly that nothing in implementation diminishes NAFDAC’s statutory authority over medicines entering the Nigerian market.
On financing, Nigeria has committed to substantially increase domestic health expenditure, including allocating at least six per cent of executed Federal and State budgets to health, projected to mobilise nearly US$3 billion during the agreement.
There is also the controversial American emphasis on predominantly Christian faith-based health institutions. Nigeria’s position should be unequivocal: healthcare investment must serve Nigerians irrespective of religion. Qualified public, private, teaching, specialist, community and faith-based institutions should benefit according to need, capacity and quality—not religious identity.
Atiku is therefore right that Nigerians deserve transparency. Publishing the operative agreement, annexes and safeguards would strengthen public confidence rather than undermine the partnership.
The agreement potentially brings substantial resources into Nigerian healthcare. That deserves recognition. But international cooperation must operate within Nigerian law, constitutional principles and sovereignty.
The issue should not be America versus Nigeria, Government versus Opposition, or Christians versus Muslims.
The issue is simpler: does the agreement improve healthcare for Nigerians while adequately protecting Nigeria’s national interest?
That is the standard by which it should be judged.
