The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) says the N10 billion emergency intervention fund released by the Federal Government was not meant for Ebola alone, but to strengthen the country’s preparedness and response to several epidemic-prone diseases.

Jide Idris, director-general of the NCDC, also said the funding represented only about two per cent of the estimated annual cost of implementing Nigeria’s National Action Plan for Health Security (NAPHS 2.0).

In a statement on Monday addressing questions surrounding the funding, Idris said the money was released directly to the NCDC to support disease prevention, preparedness, early detection, rapid response and recovery from public health emergencies.

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According to him, he sought additional funding to strengthen prevention, preparedness, readiness, early detection, rapid response and resilient recovery for diseases of public health importance, including Ebola.

He listed the diseases covered by the intervention to include Ebola, Lassa fever, cholera, cerebrospinal meningitis, diphtheria, measles, monkeypox and antimicrobial resistance.

“The request was not limited to Ebola Disease alone. It also covered other diseases that have historically caused significant illness and death in Nigeria”, he stated.

Idris clarified that the N10 billion was not released to the Presidential Task Force on Ebola Virus Disease, chaired by the Chief of Staff to the President. He said the task force was established primarily to coordinate the national response, while the NCDC received the money to address the country’s broader health security needs.

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The clarification follows public questions and competing narratives about the funding, after Nigeria confirmed an imported Ebola case on October 20, 2026.

Idris said the N10 billion allocation was, however, inadequate to meet Nigeria’s wider health security requirements. “The N10 billion allocation remains inadequate to meet Nigeria’s broader health security needs. These funding requirements are not arbitrary; they are informed by national plans, identified gaps and the cost of implementing agreed priorities,” he said.

According to him, Nigeria developed the second National Action Plan for Health Security, covering 2025 to 2029, following the expiration of its first plan.

“The estimated cost of implementing NAPHS 2.0 alone is approximately N522 billion over five years. This translates to an average of about N104.4 billion annually,” Idris said.

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He explained that the N10 billion intervention represented about two per cent of the plan’s average annual cost and should “not be presented as an excessive allocation without considering the country’s health security needs and the range of activities it was intended to support.”

The director-general said effective preparedness could prevent disease outbreaks from escalating into national emergencies, disrupting livelihoods, overwhelming health facilities and imposing greater costs on the government and citizens.

He argued that the central question should not be whether Nigeria could afford to invest adequately in health security, but whether it could afford the human, social and economic consequences of failing to do so.