In an effort to ensure that health insurance is mandatory in Nigeria, the federal government on Tuesday launched the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) operational guidelines.
Coordinating minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof. Mohammed Ali Pate, who spoke during the official launch of the guidelines, in Abuja, said the guidelines were an important turning point where health insurance can be mandatory.
According to him, the guidelines are to provide directions so that as a country, when the federal government and states contribute, with the provision of the Basic Healthcare Provision Funds (BHCPF), it will enable the expansion of affordability of healthcare for the population, especially the most vulnerable.
“As we implement this guidelines, we want to see more Nigerians being covered,” he said.
“In the last 40 to 50 years, Nigeria has been in the process of developing a guideline. We have less than 10 percent coverage now, we sre expect higher rate of coverage in the next few years and with the BHCPF, there is a portion of it that is allocated to the vulnerable group and we will make sure it gets to them, complementary to what we are also going to be investing in the Primary Healthcare arena.
“We have over 8000 primary healthcare allover the country and that are going to be receiving funds through the BHCPF,” Pate explained.
He said that the federal government was doing a lot on health, stressing the need for states to step up by putting the right people as human resources for health and provide their counterpart funding.
On his part, the director-general of NHIA, Prof. Mohammed Sambo,.said everything that have been incorporated in the Act have been expanded in this guidelines as it clearly states the roles and responsibilities of all the actors.
On vulnerable group fund, Sambo said two things that can help the country in attaining Universal Health Coverage (UHC), are making health insurance mandatory and provision for the coverage of the vulnerable group.
“These are in the law and they have been expanciated in the guidelines,” he said
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