Nigerian HIV Patients Turn to Faith Healers As Pepfar Funding Cuts Leave Clinics With No Treatment

• Trump's January 2025 halt to PEPFAR funding cut off free antiretroviral treatment for HIV patients across northern Nigeria, including a woman in Maiduguri identified as Aisha
• Aisha sold her household furniture to buy herbal remedies from a traditional healer who claimed to offer a permanent cure for HIV in a single treatment
• Traditional healers in Kano, Bauchi, Gombe and Maiduguri are exploiting the treatment gap, charging up to N250,000 for unproven Islamic medicine remedies

A woman living with HIV in Maiduguri, northern Nigeria, sold her household furniture to pay a traditional healer promising a permanent cure after a United States funding freeze left her without access to free antiretroviral treatment.

Prime Time Nigeria in August 2026 shared that Aisha, whose full name has been withheld, had for years depended on antiretroviral therapy provided at no cost through the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, known as PEPFAR. The treatment kept her viral load suppressed and her health stable.

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That changed in January 2025, when President Donald Trump ordered a halt to PEPFAR funding.

"When I went to the facility and was told the treatment was no longer available for free, my heart sank because I couldn't afford to pay for them out of pocket," she told SciDev.Net.

Although PEPFAR partially resumed operations in February 2025, the programme faced significant budget reductions.

Research by amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, found that at least 1,714 HIV service sites worldwide shut down entirely following terminated or delayed PEPFAR payments, with almost none able to replace the lost funding.

Faith healers fill the treatment void

Across urban centres in northern Nigeria including Kano, Bauchi, Gombe and Maiduguri, alternative practitioners have moved into the gap created by the funding cuts.

Operating through community networks and social media, they market herbal products with claims of total cures within months.

In Kano, Yusuf Sufi, popularly known as Sarkin Lakanin Jihar Kano, sells his HIV treatment for N45,000 (approximately $33), rising to N250,000 (around $183) for advanced AIDS regimens, and asserts that most of his patients have been cured.

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Abdullahi Umar, who runs the Kashful Aleel Islamic Medicine Centre, makes similar claims across Sokoto, Kano, Bauchi and Maiduguri.

Medical authorities are unambiguous about these assertions. Abubakar Ibrahim, a senior registrar in the Department of Internal Medicine and Infectious Disease Unit at the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, stated plainly:

"Scientifically, there's no cure to HIV using treatment. The ART we use in Nigeria cannot cure HIV."

He explained that antiretroviral therapy works by suppressing the viral load to undetectable levels, not by eliminating the virus.

Scholars condemn exploitation of religious texts

Many of these practitioners frame their products within Islamic teaching, citing a Hadith interpreted to mean that God created no disease without also creating its cure. In predominantly Muslim northern Nigeria, the religious framing carries considerable weight with patients.

Islamic scholar Muhammad Mustapha, based in Kano, pushed back firmly on this interpretation. "Selling ineffective remedies that don't perform the functions claimed is an act of deception strictly forbidden by Allah," he said, adding that anyone defrauded has a religious right to demand accountability.

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Aisha's experience bore out these warnings. After two months on the herbal remedies, her symptoms returned, and her body weakened.

"I realised I had spent everything I owned on empty promises while the virus was multiplying inside me," she said.

She now pays out of pocket for consultations, viral load tests and clinic fees that PEPFAR once covered entirely. Since its founding in 2003, PEPFAR has invested over $100 billion globally in the fight against HIV/AIDS and supported antiretroviral treatment for more than 20 million people across more than 50 countries.

In Nigeria alone, the programme disbursed over $7.8 billion, reaching more than 1.9 million people in a country that carries the fourth-largest HIV burden in the world.

Africa produces its first sickle cell treatment

YEN.com.gh earlier reported that for 18-year-old Mamadou Tahirou, growing up with sickle cell disease has meant a childhood defined by hospital visits, missed school days, and a body that looks closer to that of a 12-year-old due to the toll the illness has taken.

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Bone pain, severe anaemia, crushing fatigue, and intense headaches are a constant presence in his life. Fits of pain sometimes strike while he is in class, forcing him to leave before lessons end.

His mother, Rabiatou Diallo, spoke about her son's condition with tears in her eyes.

Source: YEN.com.gh