Nigeria cannot achieve Universal Health Coverage until the National Health Insurance Scheme is made compulsory for all Nigerians, the executive secretary of the scheme, Mohammed Sambo, has said.
A bill to repeal and replace the NHIS Act was passed by the 8th National Assembly in April and forwarded to President Muhammadu Buhari but he has neither signed it nor declined assent. “We have a plan to have a round table discussion with the senate and the house of reps so that we can look at the law and develop a high powered committee that will undertake advocacy for the purpose of signing that bill.“If we get that, we will have a very good pool in our coffers to provide care for the vulnerable population,” the NHIS boss said.Despite billions spent on the NHIS since 2005 when it took off, millions of Nigerians still lack access to quality healthcare.
The professor said the only way to determine the accurate level of coverage – especially since NHIS is yet to be made mandatory – is by establishing the total population the scheme is meant to cover which he calls the denominator. “If you cannot answer to that, then you cannot be talking of the proportion of coverage. You can only say for instance that about 100,000 people are covered,” the professor explained.Mr Sambo said his rebranding agenda will engender evidence-based information to establish the total population NHIS should cater for through accountability and transparency. This, he said would help in the calculation of the total coverage.
Source: Healthcare Press (healthcarepress.net)
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