The National Health Insurance Scheme said on Tuesday that its “Health Insurance Under One Roof” scheme would fast track progress towards ensuring quality and affordable healthcare for all Nigerians.
The Executive Secretary of NHIS, Prof. Mohammed Sambo, said this in his address of welcome at a validation meeting of the new initiative in Abuja.
HIUOR is an initiative that aims to decentralise insurance practice in Nigeria to sub-national level (states) with the central coordinating entity at the Federal level.
Sambo, who was represented by Dr. Eke Jonathan, General Manager, Formal Sector Department, NHIS, said the office was carrying out lasting reforms to achieve Universal Health Coverage among Nigerians.
“We have a new result-oriented NHIS, ready to reposition the health insurance ecosystem to focus on the collective drive towards the attainment of UHC,” he said.
Sambo said the organisation’s “Three-Point Rebranding Agenda” was anchored on restoring a value system that would transform NHIS into a credible result-driven organisation.
He said the reforms would engender transparency and accountability in the entire operations of the NHIS and accelerate the drive towards achieving universal access to quality healthcare for all Nigerians.
He said: “Under these reforms, NHIS has now become a peaceful organisation; most of the operational, financial and administrative bottlenecks are fast being resolved, and innovative strategies are being introduced.
“Notable among these reform efforts are: the strengthening of the NHIS State Offices, recovery of NHIS trapped funds, reforming the financial management system of the organisation, restoring the confidence of stakeholders and automating NHIS business processes.”
Sambo said to attain UHC in Nigeria, in alignment with the Federal Government’s health sector agenda, required an effective framework for coordination, integration and harmonisation of efforts of all stakeholders in the health insurance space in the country.
“This is the basis for the concept of HIOUR and after series of meetings and deliberations, we now have a draft policy document for HIUOR,” the NHIS boss said.
In his remarks, Dr. Niyi Oginni, Chairman, Forum of CEOs, State Health Insurance Agencies in Nigeria, commended the leadership of NHIS for recognising the poor coordination and regulation of the sector and for coming up with the HIOUR document.
Oginni, represented by Dr. Ahmed Danfulani, Vice Chairman of the forum, however, stressed the need to address the grey areas in the document.
He said: “We have drawn attention to some grey areas, which we have raised at the level of the Technical Working Group and by individual states, at different fora, but which are yet to be attended to.
“Consequently, these grey areas will be presented at this meeting with a view to resolving them before the policy document is validated.”
He reiterated the commitment of members to the successful implementation of the HIUOR policy and the desire to do everything necessary to accelerate the attainment of UHC.
Oginni said each SHIA had its own laws and operational modalities and had started to record impressive successes in coverage rates beginning from this year.
Also speaking, Dr. David Atuwo, Director, Senior Technical Assistant to Minister of State for Health, said HIOUR was a mechanism for achieving UHC and to coordinate health insurance by all operators in Nigeria.
Atuwo pledged the ministry’s support for the document and commended the World Health Organisation and other development partners for supporting the Federal Government in the development of HIUOR.
In his remarks, delivered virtually, Dr. Walter Kazadi, WHO Representative to Nigeria, pledged the UN health agency’s continued support to NHIS.
Kazadi, represented by Dr. Francis Ukwuije, Health Economist at WHO Nigeria, said the organisation would continue to work together with NHIS to achieve UHC.