Senior Cadre, Noble Alagskomah Asakeya
A group of Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in the health sector has estimated that it is possible for Ghana to have a sustainable universal free access to healthcare, once government is committed to it and will listen to ideas to generate funds to run such a system.
The group, operating under the name Ghana Coalition of NGOs in Health, has a strong conviction that a system that allows a universal free access to healthcare will considerably improve healthcare in the country.
Against this background, the Upper East regional branch of the Ghana Coalition of NGOs in Health has advocated that the annual National Health Insurance Premium payment should be scrapped.
Noble Alaskomah Asakeya, vice chairman of the coalition in the Upper East Region, gave the call in an interaction with some journalists as part of the advocacy drive in Bolgatanga. The advocacy campaign is under the theme; ‘Ghana Free Universal Healthcare Campaign 2012’.
Studies by the coalition have revealed that about 60 percent of Ghanaians at the national level have access to health facilities; however, the story is different at the rural level where less than 40 percent of the population has access to health facilities. And even with that, they have to travel for about an hour before reaching a facility.
The coalition suggested that government should consider placing extra tax on items such as sugar and alcoholic drinks and other items which had the potential of increasing the rate at which people got sick.
“If this idea is thought through and developed into a policy, it will do two things. One, it will help the country to generate more revenue than it is doing now. Two, it will make such products expensive and many will not patronize them, and by that, we will be reducing the rate at which Ghanaians consume sugar and alcohol, which are key contributors to the many health problems among Ghanaians,” he said.
“Currently, we are running a system of health financing where only people who are able to contribute to a scheme benefit from government’s direct support to individual’s healthcare. For us, this system, operated in the form of a National Health Insurance Scheme as we have in Ghana now, is unfair. It is unfair because a bigger portion of the cost of providing healthcare services to members of the NHIS is from the general tax revenue, which is contributed by all Ghanaians, rich or poor. And for a poor person who is not able to pay his or her NHIS Premium to be exempted from benefiting from this general tax, is unfair. The rich will pay a little premium and he or she is covered by NHIS funded from the general tax.”
The coalition is sponsored by a network of national and international NGOs in health, such as ISODEC, SEND-Ghana, Alliance for Reproductive Health Rights, Essential Services Platform and Oxfam.
From: Ebo Bruce-Quansah, Bolgatanga
