Access to quality healthcare remains a critical driver of life expectancy and population well-being.
Recognizing the vital role that effective medical services play in public health, Nairametrics explores the Africa Health Care Index to identify cities offering the best healthcare systems across the continent.
The Africa Health Care Index 2025 mid-year report highlights the continent’s leading cities in healthcare delivery, measuring staff competence, diagnostic capacity, service responsiveness, affordability, and accessibility.
The accompanying Health Care Exp Index provides further depth by balancing positive and negative factors.
Methodology
The ranking is based on Numbeo’s analysis of eight key factors, including the competency of medical staff, speed and accuracy of examinations, availability of modern equipment, affordability, accessibility, and responsiveness of healthcare services.
While challenges persist, the index shows that several African cities are offering increasingly reliable and efficient healthcare systems, which are critical for disease prevention, community resilience, and overall well-being.
Below are the top 10 African cities for healthcare in 2025, ranked by their Healthcare Index scores:
Healthcare Index: 68.9 | Health Care Exp. Index: 125.6 | Rank: 1
Cape Town tops Numbeo’s 2025 Mid-Year Africa Health Care Index, with a Healthcare Index score of 68.9 and a high Expenditure Index of 125.6. The city is distinguished by world-class hospitals, advanced diagnostic facilities, and strong private sector participation.
South Africa’s relatively higher healthcare spending, coupled with National Health Insurance (NHI) pilot projects, medical tourism policies, and continuous investment in specialist training, reinforces Cape Town’s healthcare leadership.
The city also ranks highly on skill and competency of medical staff, speed in completing examinations and reports, diagnostic accuracy, and modern equipment availability, making it a benchmark for healthcare quality in Africa.
Note: Lagos, which is Nigeria’s only city featured in the ranking, slipped from the 8th position in 2024 to number 11 this year.
Lagos maintained a Healthcare Index score of 47.5, unchanged from 2024. However, improvements in other African cities pushed Nigeria’s commercial capital down from 8th place in 2024 to 11th in 2025.
The decline highlights the need for Nigeria to accelerate healthcare reforms and investments to remain competitive. Across the continent, cities such as Cape Town, Durban, and Accra are making strides through stronger infrastructure, modern diagnostics, and skilled medical professionals.
Lagos continues to host Nigeria’s largest concentration of hospitals, yet public facilities remain overcrowded, infrastructure underfunded, and out-of-pocket healthcare costs high. While the private sector is expanding, its impact on nationwide outcomes remains limited, highlighting persistent gaps in accessibility and service quality.
