Sending money to Nigeria for a relative's healthcare: what it costs and what it buys

What a transfer costs today

The World Bank measures the real cost of sending money on every major corridor, fee and exchange-rate margin together. For £120 or £200 from the UK to Nigeria the average was 1.96% in August 2025. The cheapest digital services (Sendwave, Remitly, WorldRemit, Paysend) came in between zero and 0.7%; the most expensive, a bank-to-cash transfer with Western Union, was 6.34%.

Most apps now advertise no fee to Nigeria (LemFi, Taptap Send, Sendwave, WorldRemit in naira). They earn on the exchange rate instead, so compare the naira your relative receives, not the fee. On one day in September 2026 the spread between the best and worst rate for £100 was about 6.4%.

Since 1 May 2026 the Central Bank of Nigeria requires transfer operators to pay out in naira only, at a set market rate. Dollar cash pickup is gone. Transfers still usually arrive within minutes.

How much of it goes on health

Nobody publishes a clean figure. The closest evidence: a 2024 survey of Nigerian recipients found 40.8% of money received was used for emergencies including medical bills, and 48.4% for food, rent and utilities. A 2025 survey of over 650 Nigerians in the UK found most send £100 to £500 a month, and that about a quarter goes to investment with the rest split across upkeep, medical care and school fees.

Behind those numbers is the structure of Nigerian healthcare: about 72% of all health spending is paid out of pocket at the point of care (World Bank, 2023), and only around 10 to 13% of the population has any health insurance (NHIA, 2026). When a relative falls ill, the bill is real and immediate, and the family abroad is the bank.

Why money sent for care often is not spent on care

• It arrives as cash with no label. Rent, school fees and food compete for it, and a check-up that can wait usually waits.
• Many Lagos hospitals ask for a deposit of N50,000 to N200,000 before treating an emergency, even with an HMO card. A relative without that on hand waits, or borrows, or calls you.
• The person who is unwell is often the person managing the money, and they will not tell you the full picture. "I'm fine" is a way of protecting you.
• You find out after the event. A transfer confirms that money moved, not that a doctor was seen.

What the alternatives look like

One is to buy the healthcare itself rather than send the cash for it: an annual HMO plan in your relative's name, paid from abroad, so that a hospital visit is authorised on a card rather than paid at the desk. Individual plans in Lagos ran from roughly N24,000 to N600,000 a year in 2026 depending on the tier, with benefit limits and waiting periods that matter more than the headline price.

The other is to pay for the looking-after as well as the treatment: someone qualified who visits, notices, and reports back, alongside the health benefits. That is what a Kinship Plan is, and it is set up in the member's name with several people chipping in, so it works with the remittances you already send rather than instead of them.

Questions people ask

Related

• Should I keep sending money, or set up a plan?
• HMOs in Nigeria explained