The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC), the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), in collaboration with the World Bank and Resolve to Save Lives Nigeria, have unveiled a Health Security Scorecard to measure and strengthen states’ preparedness for infectious disease outbreaks and other public health emergencies.
The scorecard was unveiled on Wednesday at a Health Security Scorecard Validation Workshop in Abuja. It is expected to help states identify gaps in their health security systems and improve accountability for epidemic preparedness and response.
Speaking at the workshop, the NCDC’s Dr Oyeladun Okunromade said the initiative would provide a framework for assessing health security performance at the state level.
“We are here to assess the gaps that exist at the state level and provide an accountability framework to track health security performance at the subnational level,” Okunromade said.
The Executive Director of Programme Partnership at the NGF Secretariat, Dr Ahmad Abdulwahab, said the scorecard would provide a single framework for evaluating health security governance across Nigeria’s 36 states.
He said the tool would bring key health security indicators into one assessment framework, enabling governors to monitor progress, identify gaps and strengthen accountability.
“A core driver for our gathering today is the urgent need to establish a single, standardised health security governance assessment tool, the NGF Health Security Scorecard.
“At the Nigeria Governors’ Forum Secretariat, we firmly believe that true health security is built from the ground up. While national frameworks provide the architecture, subnational execution and accountability are the bedrock upon which epidemic preparedness, detection and response must rest.
“By harmonising disparate metrics into one unified instrument, we can eliminate fragmentation, reduce reporting fatigue, and provide state governors and policymakers with clear, actionable insights to strengthen health security accountability across all 36 states,” Abdulwahab said.
According to him, the scorecard will enable states to assess their preparedness and use the findings to guide policy decisions and investments.
“The scorecard helps assess each state’s level of preparedness and provides the data needed for informed decision-making on priority actions and improvements,” he said.
The Executive Director of Resolve to Save Lives Nigeria, Dr Nanlop Ogburuke, said the initiative would strengthen disease preparedness, prevention and response at the subnational level.
She said, “There is little that can be achieved without the states. Health security can only be effective when implemented at the subnational level. If we strengthen state capacities and empower leaders to make informed policy and investment decisions, we will be better positioned to prevent and respond to outbreaks such as cholera, Lassa fever, Ebola, and other infectious diseases.”
Ogburuke said representatives from all 36 states and development partners were reviewing health security indicators and surveillance systems to ensure the scorecard reflected state-specific realities.
