How Much Does Therapy Cost in Nigeria? (2025)

What therapy costs in Nigeria in 2026

The first thing to know about paying for therapy in Nigeria is that the scheme most guides still cite no longer exists. The National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) was repealed in 2022; its replacement, the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), makes health insurance mandatory on paper for every Nigerian and legal resident. The working reality for mental health care is that most people pay out of pocket, and no national fee schedule exists.

These are guiding estimates. Practitioners set their own fees.

NHIS is gone; NHIA is the law

The National Health Insurance Authority Act, 2022 is explicit. Its Section 58 "repeals the National Health Insurance Scheme Act, Cap. N42, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004", and Section 3 directs the new Authority to "ensure that health insurance is mandatory for every Nigerian and legal residents". The Act also creates a Vulnerable Group Fund to subsidise care for those least able to pay.

Two honest caveats belong next to that. Enrolment in practice remains far from universal, so whether you are covered depends on your employer, your state's scheme, or your own registration; several states run their own schemes on top of the federal framework, with Lagos's Ilera Eko mandatory by state law. And what any plan actually pays toward mental health care varies plan by plan; check yours before assuming either way. If a guide quotes you "NHIS coverage rules", it is describing a scheme that ceased to exist in 2022.

Where the affordable care actually is

Nigeria's public mental health care runs through two doors: the federal neuropsychiatric hospitals and the psychiatric departments of teaching hospitals. These institutions set their own fees, which are not published nationally, but as subsidised public institutions they are generally the lower-cost route, and they are the institutions built for exactly this care. Call the hospital nearest you and ask what registration and consultation cost before you go.

Private practice, psychologists, and counselling services set fees practice by practice. No Nigerian professional body publishes a fee schedule, and pages quoting exact naira rates for therapy are quoting themselves. The reliable figure is the one the practice gives you; asking about reduced rates costs nothing.

If you need someone now

Go to the emergency department of the nearest teaching hospital or federal neuropsychiatric hospital. Our page on suicide hotlines and crisis lines in Nigeria lists the services we have verified.

Sources

• National Health Insurance Authority Act, 2022, full text: Section 58 (repeal of the NHIS Act), Section 1 (establishment), Section 3 (mandatory insurance), Sections 24 to 30 (Vulnerable Group Fund). Read 28 July 2026.
• National Health Insurance Authority, nhia.gov.ng: the Authority's own site.

Reviewed July 2026. The statutory facts were read from the Act's text on 28 July 2026. This page quotes no naira figures: neither public hospital fees nor private rates have a published national source, and we do not print numbers we cannot verify.