He-RIN Calls for Boosting Local Mosquito Net Manufacturers, Rejects SNG Health Deal

The SNG Health Agreement signed with the Federal Ministry of Health has been rejected by the Health Reform Initiative Nigeria (He-RIN), a civil society organization that promotes health sector reform through increased funding, accountability, and local capacity building. He-RIN has described the agreement as self-serving, dishonest, and a purposeful attempt to cripple current local mosquito net manufacturers.

He-RIN denounced the deal that resulted in a collaboration between Vestergaard and Harvestfield and the creation of SNG Health for the provision of mosquito nets in Nigeria in a joint statement released on Wednesday by its Executive Director, Sunday Tobi, and Secretary, Abdul Musa.

The organization claims that the agreement is just an extension of the United Nations Office for Project Services’ (UNOPS) past dominance in the industry under dubious circumstances.

According to the statement, “UNOPS incubated the so-called SNG Health at the Federal Ministry of Health’s request through a Swiss company, in collaboration with the World Bank Nigeria, which operates as a sister organization to UNOPS, according to available evidence widely reported in the media weeks ago.”

He-RIN accused the Ministry of Health of purposefully undermining regional producers of insecticide-treated mosquito nets, attributing Nigeria’s ongoing malaria epidemic and inability to drastically lower malaria-related fatalities to what it claimed was the ministry’s cooperation with UNOPS years prior to the Bola Tinubu administration taking office in 2023.

Nigeria still has the highest malaria prevalence in the world, according to the group. The World Health Organization’s (WHO) World Malaria Report states that Nigeria is responsible for about 27% of all cases of malaria worldwide and 31% of all malaria-related deaths, with an estimated 184,000 deaths each year, primarily among pregnant women and children under five.

He-RIN added that despite significant governmental spending on health, this dismal result continues. According to data from the Federation’s Budget Office, Nigeria’s health sector often receives approximately 4–6% of the country’s annual budget, which is significantly less than the 15% standard set by the Abuja Declaration.

About N1.3 trillion, or little more than five percent of all government spending, was allocated to the health sector in the 2024 Federal Budget.

According to data from the National Malaria Elimination Programme (NMEP) and partner financial declarations, the organization revealed that Nigeria received and implemented about N1.5 billion for malaria control activities between 2015 and 2023.

The purchase and distribution of insecticide-treated mosquito nets (ITNs), indoor residual spraying, diagnostics, and antimalarial medications were the main uses of these funds, which were mostly supplied by the Global Fund, World Bank, USAID, and UN organizations.

He-RIN stated, “Despite this scale of investment, Nigeria continues to struggle with malaria control due to policy inconsistency, excessive reliance on imported mosquito nets, weak local manufacturing capacity, and opaque procurement practices.”

The organization recalled that the Federal Government had made plans for the local production of mosquito nets after a competitive bidding process was finished in 2022. However, the organization claimed that the process was abruptly stopped at UNOPS’s request soon after the current administration took office.

Since then, no significant investment has been made in the industry. Communities are still being devastated by mosquitoes, and Nigeria continues to hold the unfortunate title of being the nation with the highest rate of malaria worldwide,” the statement continued.

President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda for the health sector, which emphasizes a Sector-Wide Approach (SWAp) to Universal Health Coverage (UHC), increased funding, strengthened Primary Health Care through the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF), reforms under the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), health workforce development, and the promotion of local production as a pillar of a resilient health system, is directly at odds with He-RIN contended.

The group emphasized that millions of direct and indirect jobs could have been created, foreign exchange could have been saved, and malaria-related deaths could have been greatly decreased if local manufacturers had not been prevented from obtaining a proposed $100 million contract for the local production of insecticide-treated nets.

Following the failure of what it said was an attempt to redirect the $100 million plan, He-RIN insisted that SNG Health does not serve Nigeria’s best interests and described it as a re-emergence of vested interests within the Ministry of Health in partnership with UNOPS.

The organization emphasized that the President needs to look into the situation immediately to find out why, in its opinion, the Ministry of Health is putting profit-driven agreements ahead of Nigerians’ health and lives, even though malaria still kills hundreds of thousands of people every year.

The organization voiced serious concerns about the Honourable Minister of Health’s refusal to publicly acknowledge the existence of local LLIN mosquito net manufacturers in Nigeria, despite their documented supply history to organizations like the World Bank and the Global Fund, their verifiable presence, and their prior international certifications.

He-RIN said that the Minister had a blatant conflict of interest when he took office since he had previously collaborated with Vestergaard. Since then, the Minister has consistently disadvantaged Nigerian-owned manufacturers while advancing policies that benefit his personal and business interests.

It was discovered that the same Vestergaard company that was behind SNG’s partnership was also in charge of shutting down more than 20 net manufacturers in Nigeria, including the bed net clusters in Lagos, Aba, Kano, and Onitshia, when it developed its standard Llin that was given away for free to Nigerians, thereby destroying the commercial market.

The organization claims that in order to create a void that allowed SNG Health to become the favored supplier, the Minister purposefully persuaded UNOPS to reject and effectively ban local manufacturers who had committed significant personal and borrowed cash to establish LLIN plants.

He-RIN further claimed that unless the SNG Health agreement was finalized and procurement contracts could be directed directly to the SNG arrangement, the Minister would not start bids or malaria intervention programs in states backed by the World Bank.

The group claimed that without the support of any publicly available or Nigeria-specific epidemiological study, the Minister unilaterally pushed for the awarding of more than 25 million Global Fund-supported LLINs to a select group of favored companies, despite the fact that current national data indicates that various LLIN types are still effective in various parts of the nation.

He-RIN emphasized that Nigeria’s epidemiological data supports the use of various LLIN technologies adapted to local mosquito species and resistance patterns, pointing out that a single-net strategy is not scientifically justified because Lagos mosquitoes differ greatly from those in Ebonyi and Sokoto States.

The organization claimed that policies that disregard current local manufacturers who had previously invested millions of dollars to establish LLIN factories and had successfully produced nets for international donors, such as the Global Fund and the World Bank, appear to be motivated more by corruption than by public health outcomes.

He-RIN recalled that the Ministry of Health still owes local manufacturers for supplies that were delivered more than ten years ago, despite the fact that those same manufacturers once made Nigeria famous by creating the largest mosquito net in the world, which was displayed at the African Leaders’ Summit on Roll Back Malaria in Eagle Square, Abuja, and recognized by the Guinness World Records.

According to the group, the goal of creating the largest mosquito net in the world was to show off Nigeria’s manufacturing capabilities, promote long-term local production of LLINs, and support continued government and donor support for manufacturers who had taken out large loans to build factories.

He-RIN questioned why SNG Health was given priority when sovereign-backed loan guarantees of up to $40 million, along with guaranteed market access, might have helped Nigerian manufacturers achieve the same results without displacing established competitors.

The organization cautioned that because SNG Health competes in the same small market while receiving preferential treatment that distorts competition and jeopardizes the future of local business, the Minister’s current policy framework directly harms established producers.

He-RIN further claimed that the Minister purposefully delayed the issuance of tenders for World Bank-borrowed funds for more than two years, despite an increase in child malaria deaths, until the SNG Health plan was fully positioned. He-RIN warned that similar tactics are now being used under the pretense of promoting “dual” LLIN technology, despite the fact that SNG Health is not the only manufacturer of such nets worldwide and dual LLINs shouldn’t be required as Nigeria’s only option.

According to the statement, “we therefore call on President Bola Tinubu to act in the national interest by stopping the SNG Health arrangement and directing the Ministry of Health to openly account for what happened to the $100 million initiative intended for local mosquito net manufacturing.”