IMPACT OF FINANCIAL INCLUSION ON ACCESS TO HEALTH SERVICES IN NIGERIA

Abstract

The study investigates the impact of financial inclusion on access to health services in Nigeria using the Autoregressive Distributive Lag (ARDL) model on the quarterly time-series data spanning from 2000Q1-2019Q4. The results of the bounds test to cointegration indicate that a long run relationship exists between Financial inclusion and access to health services. The estimation result shows that financial inclusion proxies (access to credit) have a positive and statistically significant effect on access to health services proxy (private health expenditure) both in the short run and long run. However, the number of commercial banks and deposit/savings ratio has a negative statistically significant effect on access to health services both in the short-run and long run. Therefore, the study recommends that the regulatory authority should address the rigid process of obtaining loans in Nigeria financial institutions to increase access to credit.