A time series analysis of government expenditure and health outcomes in Nigeria.

Abstract

Despite a significant share of Nigeria's budget in the health sector, the health status has not improved, as reflected by poor health indicators. This study investigates the linkages between government expenditure and health outcomes in Nigeria. The Autoregressive Distributed Lag technique was used to examine the short- and long-run effects of government health expenditure on health outcomes separately. The health outcome was captured by life expectancy at birth and mortality rate. Findings show a negative relationship exists between health expenditure and mortality rate, implying that a rise in health expenditure leads to a decrease in mortality rate, while life expectancy at birth positively responds to the changes in health expenditure. As a policy recommendation from this study, the government should pursue increasing health expenditure and partner with the private sector in the form of Public-Private Partnerships to improve the health sector and outcomes.