Preventive health: Nigerians now more aware of health choices

…Adopt healthy lifestyles to live longer

With the cases of sudden death on the increase, there seems to be a growing campaign on healthy lifestyle, regular check-up and exercise among Nigerians in recent times.

Nigerians are increasingly aware of the importance of living longer and healthier lives, with experts saying it is driven by factors like improved healthcare and education, and a growing awareness of the impact of environmental factors like air pollution.

The experts revealed that although life expectancy is gradually increasing, challenges remain, particularly in areas like healthcare accessibility, poverty, and inequality.

Even the trend is not only among the youth alone, the elderly are becoming health conscious.

Many are joining the army of pro-health and preventive health clubs; this is despite the worsening economic climate and high cost of living in Nigeria presently.

For instance, the Nigerian Consumer Outlook Report 2025 highlights this shift, attributing it to increasing health awareness and a global movement toward prevention over cure.

While consumers are faced with rising costs, many are making intentional choices to safeguard their well-being, shifting towards locally-sourced, nutrient-rich foods and prioritising regular medical checkups.

Many fitness and wellness centres are springing up across major cities, while it is common to see large crowds of people, especially youths exercising in major junctions and parks early in the morning during the weekends and public holidays.

Samuel Uche, a lawyer, said he has been exercising regularly since the death of his father from diabetics three years ago, to keep fit.

“Exercising is now part of my routine every weekend and I take it seriously,” Uche said.

Mercy Chukwu, a medical expert, said unlike in the past when people were not too concerned about their lifestyle, just eating anything into their mouth and living a sedentary lifestyle, the trend is changing gradually.

The medical expert noted that Nigerians are now aware of the benefit of maintaining optimal health and are actively involved in those activities to promote health.

“The first point is exercise; exercise is not just going out to the gym, pay money on some activities. It can be done indoors.

“Some Nigerians have that equipment at home; they jog on the streets, have a 30 minutes’ walk, swimming, etc. Some even organise a weekly fitness day where residents of a street come out to exercise,” she said.

Chukwu further pointed out that many people are aware of the dangers of being overweight, irreversible complications that follow, while further pointing out that once the problem is identified the individual can embark on a health routine.

“We know the benefit that comes with it. For example, relaxation, strong bones help sweat toxins from the system, boost immunity, boost memory, and strengthen skin tone, among others.

“Lack of sleep, poor concentration, obesity, metabolic disorders like diabetes, muscle weakness, arthritis are as a result of sedentary lifestyle and in the long run these health issues start setting in.”

Read also: Report: Food, health, wellness top spending priority of Nigerians

Need for regular exercise emphasised

Recently, an argument ensued among commuters inside the Lagos Blue Line Train from Mile 2 to Marina, and the conversation was on healthy lifestyle; they were four men who are mostly traders.

Two of the men, a 60-year-old and another 72-year-old based their argument on dieting and exercising to keep fit. However, the 72-year man who was a retired athlete looked much younger and he told other commuters that he does not joke with his daily exercises even after retirement from active sporting activities, and also does not joke with eating bitters.

“Quite a lot of people just eat without knowing the right recombination or proportion of what they should eat to get what they want to nourish the body,” Taofeek Yekeen, a professor of Biology from the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH), Ogbomoso, Oyo State.

According to him, Nigerians should imbibe the habit of eating food as medicine rather than eating medicine as food, especially later in life, while aging.

“Although food prices are on the increase in recent times, knowing the right combinations or proportions may make it cheaper and purposely achieve one’s desire,” he said.

He also opined that more Nigerians are getting aware of their health choices because of the cost implication on the household.

“Eating junks and craps will continue to have an effect on people’s health because of various additives that can accumulate in the human system. A major solution is awareness through seminars, among others,” Yekeen said.

Olamoyegun Michael, a consultant on diabetes with LAUTECH Teaching Hospital, said that more Nigerians are paying keen attention to their health choices based on the level of information currently available to them.

According to him, more Nigerians are exposed to social media than it used to be, and that is contributing to the choices people are making either in relation to their health or other aspects of their life. “So, that also would moderate whatever action that people want to take,” he said.

He disclosed that there was nothing bad with Nigerian traditional foods, which have been found to be healthy, and are low in sugar. He said that the local foods are very high in fibres, and that it has been proven that the more food-containing fibres that people eat, the healthier they will be.

Michael, who is also a pharmacologist, disclosed that being conscious of health choices is good, especially in relation to choice of food intake.

He said that some people have the notion that eating traditional food (local foods like eba, rice, yam, among others) are not quite good for health.

“Bitter-kola has been proven scientifically to be effective in many ways, to manage some of the disease conditions, and there are publications, well-researched publications on their uses,” he said.

He however sounded some note of caution against abuse by consumers. According to him, trado-medicines could be abused because of lack of measurement, which is not the case with orthodox medicines.

“I need to put this in perspective; if you look at the traditional drugs, although people are coming up with measurements, they are not as well organised as the orthodox medicine, but to say that it should not work, it’s not completely true, some of them do work,” he said.

Read also: Healthcare lapses leave even the insured paying out of pocket

Cost-of-living crisis

According to the latest data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Nigeria’s headline inflation rose to 24.23 percent in March 2025, up from 23.18 percent recorded in February.

The figure represents a 1.05 percentage point increase, marking a sustained rise in the general price level across the country.

While the increase looked insignificant at face value, it is however, not the same when compared to Nigeria’s human development index, which measures a long and healthy life, access to knowledge.

This is so because the latest Quality of Living Index by Global Citizen Solutions ranked Nigeria low with regards to quality of life.

The report ranked Nigeria 135th out of 199 countries, with an overall score of 54.1. The rating took into consideration the availability and cost of day-to-day amenities, such as cost of living among so many other factors, reflecting the current cost-of-living-crisis in Nigeria.

At 54.1, Nigeria comes behind African countries such as Namibia (87th), South Africa (88), Tunisia (90th), Ghana (91st), Seychelles (101st), Morocco (103rd), Senegal (106), Botswana (107), Algeria (108) and Cote d’ Ivoire at 115th, among others.

On a month-on-month basis, inflation rose sharply by 3.90 percent in March, compared to 2.04 percent in February, indicating that the average price level increased at a faster pace.

“The Consumer Price Index rose to 117.34 in March 2025, reflecting a 4.40-point increase from the preceding month.”

While this might not be the focus of everyday Nigerian, it however, gives credence to how more and more Nigerians continue to spend heavily on feeding by paying less attention to healthy living on the back of the high cost of food exacerbated by inflationary pressure on households.