Saving the NHIS!

In most of these medical centres, patients on NHIS have to wait on end for medication, while paying members of the public are attended to. The simple reason is that the service is not prompt with payments due service deliverers.

In the Ashanti Region, where the capitation grant is being experimented, for instance, the ridiculous sum of GH¢1.75 recommendation per patient per month is serving as a disincentive for medical centres to treat patients on the NHIS.

To crown a comedy, state health centres in the Ashanti Region are mandated to treat patients in the region on a ridiculous fee of GH¢0.59. In other words, the life of a person living in the Ashanti Region is worth GH¢0.59 a month, a sum which cannot buy breakfast for a 10 year-old child in Ghana.

To add to the problem, staff of the service throughout the country have decided to vote with their feet. As a prelude to the industrial action, workers employed by the service are on orders from their leadership to wear red armbands with effect from yesterday.

What this means is that sooner, rather than later, NHIS staff throughout the country would lay down their working materials, badly damaging whatever is left of the service.

The Chronicle is worried stiff by this development. When the social democratic credentials of the ruling National Democratic Congress were on full display in the run up to the 2008 Presidential and Legislative Elections, then candidate John Evans Atta Mills went round the country promising to bring about a one-term premium for all who depend on the NHIS for health delivery.

With less than 10 months to the end of the term of this administration, the one-term premium has failed to materialise. In its place, we have a service that is all, but dead. It is a shame that an administration, founded on social democratic principles, has failed woefully in its social interventionist policies.

The silent but gradual death of the NHIS is putting the large mass of our people at risk. The high cost of medical care in this country means that many citizens would not be able to afford medical care if the NHIS is allowed to die.

The Chronicle is inviting all stakeholders to dialogue on the health of the NHIS. The condition of the service does no good to the image of this nation. We cannot be a worthy member of the Middle Income community, when the State of Ghana cannot even take care of the sick. That is why the NHIS should be saved!

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