About 98.5 per cent of the numerous pilot health projects in Nigeria and Africa fail due to lack of sustainability, financing, integration, and large-scale adoption.

Consequently, stakeholders in the health sector have emphasised the need to scale up digital health innovations and accelerate the adoption of sustainable digital solutions that improve health outcomes across Nigeria and Africa.

They noted that while significant investments have been made in digital health solutions across the continent, many innovations continue to face challenges related to sustainability, financing, integration, governance, and large-scale adoption.

At a roundtable with the theme: ‘From Pilot to Scale, Shaping the Future of Health Innovation’, the health experts advanced practical approaches for moving digital health innovations from pilots to sustainable scale.

Speaking at the event, Technical Director of The Network for Health Equity and Development (NHED), Dr Jerome Mafeni, noted that despite the multiplicity of pilot health programmes and digital programmes that are being run, not just within the country but across the entire continent, so much resources are invested in running small pilots that never eventually get funded even when the results show clearly that they work for the benefit of the vast majority.

Mafeni pointed out that the event will help key stakeholders across the entire health system value chain to look at how to move away from investing in multiple small pilot programmes that never get funded. He noted that Nigeria’s health system is heavily fragmented, largely inefficient and does not deliver to promise.

He stated that Nigeria has a very poor health index and stressed the need to improve efficiency, effectiveness, and ensure better supervision for quality service delivery.