Abstract
Niger State in central Nigeria faces a range of natural, biological, and security hazards. To inform preparedness and health security planning, a multi-hazard risk assessment was conducted using WHO’s Strategic Tool for Assessing Risks (STAR), this is one of the first applications of WHO STAR at a state level in Nigeria. A cross-sectional study was conducted using the WHO STAR. Stakeholders involved identified hazards across natural, biological, technological, and societal domains through review of surveillance, disaster, and meteorological data. Hazards were scored for likelihood, impact, vulnerability, and coping capacity, with composite risk indices used to rank and categorize them. Priority hazards were further analysed for seasonality and geographic distribution, and findings validated through consensus. Eighteen major hazards were identified, spanning biological, environmental, and societal. Seven hazards emerged as very high risk, notably flooding, banditry/kidnapping. Six were high risk (e.g. fire outbreaks), four moderate (e.g. acute flaccid paralysis), and one low risk (diphtheria). Six hazards showed clear seasonal patterns. Priority hazards were further examined for geographic distribution and validated through consensus. The STAR assessment produced an evidence-based risk profile highlighting flooding, banditry/kidnapping, boat mishaps, cholera, and rain/windstorms as the most critical hazards. Actionable recommendations were developed to support preparedness, mitigation, and response efforts across sectors. The findings offer a structured basis for strengthening disaster risk governance and can inform the development and implementation of Niger state’s emergency preparedness plans.
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
Data used will be available through the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Abbreviations
- AFENET:
-
African field epidemiology network
- AFP:
-
Acute flaccid paralysis
- CSM:
-
Cerebrospinal meningitis
- DRR:
-
Disaster risk reduction
- FRSC:
-
Federal road safety corps
- IFRC:
-
International federation of red cross and red crescent societies
- LGAs:
-
Local government areas
- LMICs:
-
Low and middle income countries
- MDAs:
-
Ministries, departments, and agencies
- NCDC:
-
Nigeria centre for disease control
- NEMA:
-
National emergency management agency in Nigeria
- NiMET:
-
Nigerian meteorological agency
- NSEMA:
-
Niger state emergency management agency
- OCHA:
-
Office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs
- STAR:
-
Strategic tool for assessing risk
- UNDP:
-
United Nations development programme
- UNICEF:
-
United Nations children’s fund
- UN:
-
United Nations
- WASH:
-
Water, sanitation, and hygiene
- WHO:
-
World Health Organization
References
UNDRR. Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction (United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), 2019).
Mizutori, M. Reflections on the Sendai framework for disaster risk reduction: five years since its adoption. Int. J. Disaster Risk Sci. 11 (2), 147–151 (2020).
Nashwan, A. J., Ahmed, S. H., Shaikh, T. G. & Waseem, S. Impact of natural disasters on health disparities in low-to middle-income countries. Discover Health Syst. 2 (1), 23 (2023).
Ifrc, O. R. World Disasters Report 2020 (IFRC Geneva, 2020).
Hochrainer-Stigler, S. et al. Toward a framework for systemic multi-hazard and multi-risk assessment and management. IScience 26(5), 106736 (2023).
Raimi, M. O., Vivien, O. T. & Oluwatoyin, O. A. Creating the healthiest nation: Climate change and environmental health impacts in Nigeria: A narrative review. Morufu Olalekan Raimi, Tonye Vivien Odubo & Adedoyin Oluwatoyin Omidiji Creating the Healthiest Nation: Climate Change and Environmental Health Impacts in Nigeria: A Narrative Review. Scholink Sustainability in Environment. ISSN. 2021 Feb 9. (2021).
Ideki, O. & Weli, V. E. Assessment of drought vulnerability and occurrence zones in North central Nigeria. Atmospheric Clim. Sci. 9 (03), 298 (2019).
Umar, N. & Gray, A. Flooding in nigeria: a review of its occurrence and impacts and approaches to modelling flood data. Int. J. Environ. Stud. 80 (3), 540–561 (2023).
Izuogu, C. U. et al. Rural-farmers’ response to climate change in Nigeria—a review. in Energy transition, climate action and sustainable agriculture: perspectives and strategies for Africa. 527– 44 (Springer, Cham, 2025).
Mohammed, U. et al. Effects of banditry on income and livelihoods of Yam marketers in Shiroro local government area of Niger state, Nigeria. J. Agric. Food Sci. 19 (1), 163–178 (2021).
Stalhandske, Z. et al. Global multi-hazard risk assessment in a changing climate. Sci. Rep. 14 (1), 5875 (2024).
Mashi, S. A., Oghenejabor, O. D. & Inkani, A. I. Disaster risks and management policies and practices in nigeria: A critical appraisal of the National emergency management agency act. Int. J. Disaster Risk Reduct. 33, 253–265 (2019).
Acosta-España, J. D., Romero-Alvarez, D., Luna, C. & Rodriguez-Morales, A. J. Infectious disease outbreaks in the wake of natural flood disasters: global patterns and local implications. Le Infezioni Med. 32 (4), 451 (2024).
World Health Organization. Strategic Toolkit for Assessing Risks (STAR): a Comprehensive Toolkit for all-hazards Health Emergency Risk Assessment (World Health Organization, 2021).
Adabara, E. F. et al. Cholera outbreak in Niger state Nigeria, May to August 2021: an unmatched case-control study. J. Interventional Epidemiol. Public. Health. 7, 38 (2024).
Elimian, K. et al. Epidemiology, diagnostics and factors associated with mortality during a cholera epidemic in Nigeria, October 2020–October 2021: a retrospective analysis of National surveillance data. BMJ open. 12 (9), e063703 (2022).
Gambo Madaki, S. A. Comparative assessment of flood hazard susceptibility modeling in Niger State, North-Central Nigeria. in Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Climate Change Adaptation: Adapting To Flood Risk. 119–132 (Springer International Publishing, Cham, 2024).
Adenle, A. A., Boillat, S. & Speranza, C. I. Key dimensions of land users’ perceptions of land degradation and sustainable land management in Niger State, Nigeria. Environ. Challenges. 8, 100544 (2022).
Ojo, J. S., Oyewole, S. & Aina, F. Forces of terror: armed banditry and insecurity in North-west Nigeria. Democracy Secur. 19 (4), 319–346 (2023).
Balgah, R. A., Ngwa, K. A., Buchenrieder, G. R. & Kimengsi, J. N. Impacts of floods on agriculture-dependent livelihoods in Sub-saharan africa: an assessment from multiple geo-ecological zones. Land 12 (2), 334 (2023).
Echendu, A. J. & Flooding Food security and the sustainable development goals in nigeria: an assemblage and systems thinking approach. Social Sci. 11 (2), 59 (2022).
Okon, E. M. et al. Systematic review of climate change impact research in nigeria: implication for sustainable development. Heliyon 7(9), e07941 (2021).
Elimian, K. O. et al. Descriptive epidemiology of cholera outbreak in Nigeria, January–November, 2018: implications for the global roadmap strategy. BMC public. Health. 19 (1), 1264 (2019).
Yunusa, E. & Owoyemi, J. O. Rural development and resource-based conflict in north-central Nigeria: Escalation, consequences and management. Int. J. Emerg. Multidisciplinaries:Biomed. Clin. Res. https://doi.org/10.54938/ijemdbmcr.2025.03.1.356 (2025).
Babajide, F., Olaogun, M., Oluwadele, L., Ijeoma, J. & Idoko, S. The state of internally displaced persons (IDPS) in Nigeria and implications to National security: Northwest and North central in focus. IOSR J. Humanit. Social Sci. 29 (1), 1 (2024).
Charnley, G. E., Kelman, I. & Murray, K. A. Drought-related cholera outbreaks in Africa and the implications for climate change: a narrative review. Pathogens Global Health. 116 (1), 3–12 (2022).
Akingbola, A. et al. Cholera outbreak in nigeria: History, review of socioeconomic and meteorological Drivers, diagnostic Challenges, and artificial intelligence integration. Global Health Epidemiol. Genomics. 2025 (1), 8898076 (2025).
McGlade, J. et al. Hirsch, F. Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction 2019 13 (UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, 2019 May).
Sanusi, U. et al. Flood vulnerability analysis in the down stream of Shiroro dam and environs. Water Environ. Sustain. 3 (4), 41–49 (2023).
Onwunta, I. E. et al. Recurrent cholera outbreaks in nigeria: A review of the underlying factors and redress. Decoding Infect. Transmission. 3, 100042 (2025).
Amisu, B. O. et al. Cholera resurgence in africa: assessing progress, challenges, and public health response towards the 2030 global elimination target. Le Infezioni Med. 32 (2), 148 (2024).
Obah-Akpowoghaha, N. G. & Tarro, O. V. M. L. Porous borders and the challenge of National integration in africa: A reflection of Ghana, Republic of Benin and Nigeria. J. Afr. Foreign Affairs 7(3), 5–150 (2020).
Trogrlić, R. Š. et al. Challenges in assessing and managing multi-hazard risks: A European stakeholders perspective. Environ. Sci. Policy. 157, 103774 (2024).
Wang, P., Asare, E. O., Pitzer, V. E., Dubrow, R. & Chen, K. Floods and diarrhea risk in young children in low-and middle-income countries. JAMA Pediatr. 177 (11), 1206–1214 (2023).
Balikuddembe, J. K., Reinhardt, J. D., Zeng, W., Tola, H. & Di, B. Public health priorities for Sino-Africa Cooperation in Eastern Africa in context of flooding and malaria burden in children: a tridecadal retrospective analysis. BMC public. Health. 23 (1), 1331 (2023).
Suhr, F. & Steinert, J. I. Epidemiology of floods in sub-Saharan africa: a systematic review of health outcomes. BMC public. Health. 22 (1), 268 (2022).
Sanga, V. T., Karimuribo, E. D. & Hoza, A. S. One health in practice: benefits and challenges of multisectoral coordination and collaboration in managing public health risks: A meta-analysis. Int. J. One Health. 10 (1), 26–36 (2024).
Acknowledgements
We sincerely appreciate the staff and management of the Niger State Ministry of Secondary and Tertiary Health, as well as the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC), for providing a supportive environment during the data collection phase of this study. Also, USCDC is appreciated for their supportive guidance.
Funding
Sydani Group paid the publication fees.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
O.D.A., A.J., S.A., A.D and S.S conceived the study. O.D.A., A.J., A.D., A.M., G.E., C.N.A., N.I., A.O., D.P.D., P.B.G., and I.I designed the data collection plan, trained the stakeholders on the WHO STAR, collected and analysed the data. O.D.A developed the methodology, C.N.A developed the first draft. H.I.O., R.R. and O.D.A reviewed the first draft. All authors contributed to revising the manuscript and approving the final draft.
Corresponding authors
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Ethical approval
Ethical approval was obtained from the Niger State Ministry of Secondary and Tertiary Health with approval number: ERC PAN/2025/06/46. The study protocol conformed to the ethical guidelines of the Declaration of Helsinki (eight revision). In addition, the methodology aligns with the approved protocol.
Human ethics and consent to participate
All participants provided informed consent before participation in discussions and data provision. No individual-level health data were collected.
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary Information
Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
About this article
Cite this article
Awoyale, O.D., Jimoh, A., Dede, A. et al. Strengthening disaster preparedness and health security in Niger state, Nigeria through a WHO STAR–based multi-hazard risk assessment. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-34702-z
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-34702-z
