Faced with a plethora of petitions from members of the public alleging poor implementation of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has called on the Federal Government to review the Scheme to address some noticeable challenges. The Rights Commission has disclosed its intention to invite the leadership of the scheme to explain why beneficiaries were experiencing difficulties in accessing medical services. Executive Secretary of the Commission, Bem Angwe, made the call yesterday in a chat with journalists at the Commission headquarters.The National Health Insurance Scheme was established in 2005 with the aim of ensuring that Nigerians have access to basic medical care and treatment at any time. But the scheme is yet to achieve much success, according to stakeholders. Stakeholders who spoke with our correspondent have attributed the uninspiring coverage to “poor health indices” recorded every year in the country. They also noted that countries that have achieved total health insurance coverage have the best health indices. However, those enrolled under the health insurance scheme are also not happy. A public servant with one of the federal institutions, who spoke with our correspondent in Lagos, said the scheme was exploitative in its implementation.
The patient, Mr. Sunny Philips, said major health challenges were not covered under the scheme, though they were stated otherwise. He said: “It is almost humiliating for me when I go to the hospital and they are reluctant to treat us because some minor cases are not covered by the scheme. In fact, they will rather attend to the patient who is paying in cash to them. “But when I rushed my daughter, who was very sick, to the hospital last month, the doctor eventually bailed me out. He told me that government had not settled the bills of the patients under NHIS in the last six months; hence, he would not be able to treat her for now and advised me to look for cash. I had to go back home to get my ATM for money before they treated my daughter.”
Another pharmacist, who spoke under the condition of anonymity, said she was yet to be paid for the drugs she had dispensed to patients under the scheme in her pharmacy in the last one year. She said: “I do not think government wants it to work because they are frustrating the stakeholders. You cannot operate health care the way you operate a ministry. If you do not pay me for the drugs I have dispensed, I cannot keep giving drugs out for free. There is a lot of politics going on behind the scene.”
Source:Medical World Nigeria
