Nigeria
Preventing HIV acquisition during pregnancy and breastfeeding is one of the key strategies to eliminate vertical transmission of HIV in Nigeria.
Background
Nigeria’s national guidelines for HIV prevention, treatment and care recommend the provision of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to individuals at substantial risk of HIV acquisition, including pregnant and breastfeeding women. Oral PrEP is the recommended option for pregnant and breastfeeding women, while Nigeria has adopted injectable PrEP as an additional option for other populations at substantial risk of HIV infection.Â
Nigeria has integrated PrEP service delivery into antenatal and post-natal care services using both provider-initiated and client-initiated approaches to identify and offer PrEP to eligible women. The country employs community outreach models to strengthen demand creation, support PrEP use continuity, and promote adherence.
In facilities, clinicians have engaged mentor mothers to increase PrEP awareness among pregnant and breastfeeding women.  Â
Progress toward elimination targets, 2024
| Elimination of vertical transmission | |
|---|---|
| Pregnant women who received ART for VTP (#) | 31,095 |
| Pregnant women needing ART for VTP (#) | 94,000 |
| Coverage of pregnant women who receive ART for VTP (%) | 33 |
| Early infant diagnosis < 2 months of age (%) | 18 |
| New HIV infection among children (#) | 22,000 |
| New HIV infections averted due to VTP interventions | 8,200 |
| Final vertical transmission rate including during breastfeeding (%) | 23.4 |
| Number of HIV-exposed children who are uninfected | 1,000,000 |
| Source: UNAIDS country fact sheet 2023 | |
HIVE-Supported National PrEP Assessments
Nigeria conducted a national PrEP self- assessment in April 2026, aiming to evaluate how HIV testing services and PrEP services for pregnant and breastfeeding women are implemented and monitored. The assessment focused on key areas including HIV testing policies,  PrEP guidelines, service delivery, eligibility and initiation, demand creation, monitoring and evaluation, and community monitoring. The assessment identified strengths in the HIV testing policies; however, the PrEP guidelines needed improvements to strengthen guidance on integration of MCH and PrEP services for PBFW. The assessment also highlighted the need to improve service delivery to improve uptake and PrEP continuation. Further, the assessment identified gaps in documentation of PrEP services, particularly the disaggregation of data for pregnant and breastfeeding women; however, the planned rollout of electronic medical records is expected to strengthen the recording and reporting of PrEP services. While demand creation and community monitoring systems were found to be strong, gaps remain in community follow-up mechanisms to support PBFW on PrEP. The figure below summarizes the findings of the national PrEP assessment.Â
HIVE Engagement
Nigeria joined HIVE in August 2024 and has been actively engaged in HIVE learning network activities since. In December 2024, Nigeria conducted a self-assessment of its VTP program using HIVE’s vertical transmission elimination tool, the VTE CMM.
The results showed Nigeria’s strengths and gaps in HIV testing policy at ANC, PrEP for PBFW, differentiated service delivery (DSD) scale-up plans for PBFW, coordination of differentiated ART models for PBFW and infants, procurement and stock management of VTP commodities, adherence to EID schedules, elimination of vertical transmission of hepatitis B, and impact.Â
Overview of Nigeria’s 2024 VTP self-assessment results