The National Health Insurance Scheme, (NHIS), in the Upper West Region has seen an increase in the number of subscribers by 33, 041 over the last six months
In December 2017, the membership of the scheme was 391,068 as at June 2018, it was 424, 109, representing a growth of 8.4% over the period.
The Upper West Regional Director of the National Health Insurance Authority, (NHIA), Abass Suleymana who shared the statistics at the mid-year performance review meeting in Wa added that 51% of the people in the Region are enrolled unto the scheme, higher than the national average of 37%.
Mr. Suleymana traced the evolution of healthcare financing in Ghana from 1957 to date and said the NHIS is contributing significantly as far as health outcomes are concerned and that the government is also doing well by supporting the scheme through what he termed “health spending”.
Ghana’s out of pocket expenditure per capita decreased from $38 in 2010 to 25 Dollars in 2015. That’s according to the NHIS’s Upper West Regional Director, Abass Suleymana.
Financial sustainability, identification of the poor and vulnerable, delays in reimbursing service providers due to huge volumes and values of claims, compromised quality of care, illegal charges to insured members as well as delays in the submission of claims have been identified as some of the challenges of the National Health Insurance Scheme.
Mr. Suleymana outlined some efficiency measures being rolled out to up thegame in service delivery.
To this end, the scheme will ensure financial sustainability of the scheme through innovative efficiency measures which include: Proposed additional funding sources; digitization of membership registrations and renewals; rolling out electronic-claim nationwide; strengthening quality assurance and financial auditing for improved accountability to the public as well as the review of the current law to introduce measures that allows stiffer sanctions to reduce fraud and other malfeasance to serve asa deterrent to criminal minds.
In the Upper West Region, the Wa Municipality has the highest coverage of 71 % in terms of active members as at June 2018 whilst Wa East District has the lowest of 32%.
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Source: GBC Ghana