THE DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH INSURANCE IN NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

In Nigeria, health insurance is not a commonly purchased financial instrument. Recently debates have revolved around extending health insurance coverage to a wider range of the population, via compulsory insurance scheme.  However, the debate rarely considers the competing demands placed on the family budget. In this work, we examined the factors that will increase the benefits of those that have health insurance cover in the formal sector and the factors that will influence the demand for health insurance cover in the informal sector of Nigeria. Our analysis suggests that timely service, cost and income are the most important factors that influence benefits and that will increase the demand for health insurance cover in Nigeria. Compulsory health insurance scheme will create additional burdens for households, and it is necessary for the government to simultaneously implement welfare or subsidy policy in order to be effective. This work employed principal component Analysis (PCA) to analyze a total sum of five hundred (500) individuals sampled on the factors that influence the demand for health insurance cover both in formal and informal sector; upon which the findings and recommendations put forward in this work were made possible.