Some world and regional organisations yesterday announced plans to expand access to quality healthcare in Nigeria, as a result disclosed an investment of $66.8 million in Hygeia Nigeria Limited, one of Nigeria’s private healthcare firm.
The organisations include the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group; Investment Fund for Health in Africa (IFHA-11), a private equity fund focused on investing in the healthcare sector in sub-Saharan Africa; Swiss Re, a reinsurance company, and CIEL Healthcare Africa Limited, a pan-African healthcare company.
The new investment is said to improve healthcare infrastructure and increase access to quality healthcare services in Nigeria.
In addition to providing capital, the partnership promises to increase and broaden the technical expertise at Hygeia and ensure global best practices through the involvement of Ciel Healthcare Africa, which works with Fortis, an integrated healthcare delivery service provider in India.
Through this project, the organisations believe Hygeia will be empowered with the capacity to reach more than 2 million patients over the seven-year investment period.
Speaking during the Hygeia/IFC official signing ceremony at the IFC office in Lagos, Fola Laoye, chairperson of the board of Hygeia Nigeria, said as Nigeria’s foremost and leading private integrated healthcare services provider, “Hygeia is consistently seeking ways to improve and expand its offerings so that it can offer more Nigerians world-class services at affordable rates and help to reverse the growing trend to travel abroad for care.”
According to Laoye, “IFC and IFHA, our long-term partners, are working with us to achieve our aim of closing the gap of quality healthcare service delivery in Nigeria. We are excited to bring on board reputable new partners like Swiss Re and Ciel Healthcare Africa.”
Hygeia operates a network of two hospitals and three clinics under the Lagoon Hospitals brand and a health maintenance organisation, Hygeia HMO and it is expanding its operations by upgrading and increasing capacity at existing hospitals, she said.
Commenting on the investment, Eme Essien, IFC country manager for Nigeria, said “IFC is committed to financing integrated healthcare and more people will get better access to quality and cost effective healthcare in Nigeria through the investment.”
“IFHA-11 believes that we have a strong consortium of partners in place to help realise growth at Hygeia. Nigeria is a key market for IFHA-11 and through our investment in Hygeia we will be able to expand access to quality healthcare across the country,” Max Coppoolse, managing partner, IFHA-11, said.
