By Abdulkareem Idris
Experts in Ekiti State have sought the engagement of both the formal and informal sectors to buy into the health insurance scheme towards helping the vulnerable in the state to have access to high-quality essential health services.
The Experts, in separate interviews said that to achieve the Universal Health Coverage (UHC), more awarness creation and sensitization should be carried out to educate the public on the importance of health insurance scheme.
Dr. Idowu Ade-Ojo, Consultant, Gynecologist-Obstetrician, with the Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital, lamented that most state governments are the sole financiers of the health insurance scheme while calling on both the private and public sectors to key into the programme.
According to him, sharing the financial burden of healthcare costs will require the contributions of everybody towards helping the vulnerable in the state.
He said: “Health Insurance is actually a social insurance where contributions from individuals, households, businesses and the government are pooled together to finance health care and has been successfully implemented in many developed countries to improve the efficiency of healthcare systems and address equity issues.
“That means government in a way will allow people, particularly, who are in the working sector to contribute certain percentage from their monthly salary into a pool that will benefit those people that are sick.
“Most states in the country, the government is the sole financier of the insurance scheme but ideally it should be the people pooling money together, which maybe an organised setting or private setting and even some people are not working with government or private but other settings like artisans. Everybody can be tasked to bring some money to contribute to the pool. In Ekiti State, the workers have not yet keyed into this, the government is the sole financier for now.
“When we look at those people that are vulnerable, we are looking at it from the angle of people that may not be totally in control of their finances. That’s why we look at women, particularly during pregnancy, belonging to this group, children are also within this group because they are dependants. We are also looking at old people and then the physically challenged.
“Out-of-pockets spending has been an issue. Most of the time, sickness, particularly some emergency situations don’t give you notice when sickness, ill health can occur when you don’t even expect it.
“Health insurance is a way to make sure that health care is affordable and available to all. So, you don’t have to spend money from your pocket. It is like a prepaid. Money that has been prepaid to be able to augment when you are not feeling fine.
“I know that the government have been trying. They have been on the issue of the health insurance scheme. There has to be cooperation from the labour unions to key into it. The government has to appeal to the labour unions for them to know the benefits.
“There is also a synergy between the state and the federal. The National Health Insurance Authority, though with all its shortcomings is running and gradually improving from time to time. The state will have to do a lot of work to get both the formal and informal sectors to buy into the health insurance scheme.
“A lot of sensitization is very necessary because people in this environment, people still believe that government should do everything for them. That is why it is difficult for government to actually implement this but with time, people would know the importance and key into it. That is the way to go if you want health to be available to all, affordable to all and accessible to all. The best way to achieve that is through the health insurance scheme.”
Similarly, Dr. Doherty Olusegun, General Manager of Ekiti State Health Insurance Scheme, said the agency in the state engaged the equity sector to help the vulnerable in the state receive the health services they need without suffering financial hardship.
According to him, the state government introduced ‘Ulera Wa’ as a sustainable scheme to help the vulnerable in the areas of immunization, family planning, malaria prevention and other minor surgeries like removal of fibroids etc.
He noted that towards achieving the universal health coverage, the agency leveraged on donors, who are donating to the federal government to cater for the vulnerable without facing financial hardship.
He said: “Health Insurance in Ekiti State is very accessible, when we talk about health insurance generally, that means we are talking about state’s health insurance and national health insurance.
“We have four pillars – formal sector, informal sector, community sector and equity sector. Presently, Ekiti State Health Insurance is doing Equity type and it is the one where the government is offering free health insurance to some categories of citizens like the vulnerable people while the National health insurance is doing the other sectors.
“Under the equity pillar, which we do in Ekiti State Health Insurance, we have two tasks presently. First, basic health care provision fund which was initiated by the federal government whereby 1% of consolidated revenue is being earmarked for health care.
“Also, we have other donors who are donating to the FG which we are using. It covers a lot of categories of people like under 5, pregnant women, old people and they are treated free for different diseases.
“The second one is Ulera Wa. In Basic Healthcare Provision Fund, Ekiti State has a quota. The first we were given was 18,000, the second was 23,000 and we are just being given 32,000. When the government of Ekiti State looked at it, it’s nothing when we have a population of 3 million, whereby 1.2 million are living below poverty line and that was why Ekiti State started Ulera Wa.
“Ulera Wa” takes care of under-5, pregnant women, immunization, family planning and malaria for everybody because malaria constitutes 70% of diseases that exist in Ekiti State. It cover some and other minor surgeries like removal of fibroids, drainages etc. UCH is a sustainable scheme, it is not ending soon because it is a continuous process.”