By Mary Oluwaseun Fakunmoju
I remember sitting with a young mother in a crowded clinic in Lagos, watching her anxiously fidget with the last few naira notes in her palm. She had two choices—pay for malaria treatment for her feverish son or save that money for rent due in three days. She looked at me and whispered, “If I treat him today, where will we sleep tomorrow?”
That moment broke me. But it wasn’t the first time I had seen someone forced to make an impossible choice between survival and healthcare. Across Nigeria and many parts of Africa, this is an everyday reality for millions of people, especially women and marginalized groups. Healthcare is still a privilege when it should be a fundamental right.
The Cost of Health or the Cost of Survival?
Malaria, one of the deadliest yet most preventable diseases, continues to claim lives—not because treatment doesn’t exist, but because access to it is unaffordable or inconsistent. Women, especially those in low-income communities, bear the brunt of these inequalities. They are caregivers, breadwinners, and the first line of defense in family health, yet they are also the most economically vulnerable.
For a sex worker who contracts malaria, seeking treatment could mean losing a day’s earnings and, in turn, being unable to feed her children. For a queer woman facing workplace discrimination, spending money on healthcare could mean risking homelessness. For a woman living with HIV, untreated malaria could be fatal, yet seeking help might expose her to further stigma within the healthcare system.
This is not just about malaria. It’s about a system that forces people to gamble with their survival.
We cannot continue to normalize a system where healthcare is a luxury. The intersection of gender, poverty, and health inequity must be addressed through urgent, gender-responsive policies:
🟥 Subsidized or Free Malaria Treatment: Governments must prioritize universal access to malaria treatment, ensuring that no one has to choose between survival and medication.
🟥Community-Based Health Interventions: Strengthening healthcare at the grassroots level will help reach the most vulnerable populations, including women in informal economies, queer women, and people living with HIV.
🟥 Health Insurance That Works: Many existing health schemes exclude informal workers, yet they are the majority. We need inclusive policies that truly leave no one behind.
🟥 Ending Stigma in Healthcare: No one should fear discrimination when seeking medical attention. Healthcare providers must be trained on gender-sensitive and inclusive approaches.
A Call to Action
This International Women’s Day, we must move beyond conversations and demand action. No woman—regardless of her background, job, or identity—should have to choose between rent and lifesaving treatment.
Health is not a privilege. It is a right.
We need policies that acknowledge the realities of marginalized women, not just blanket solutions that assume everyone starts from the same place. We need a system that sees us, values us, and protects us.
The time to act is now!
