More than 13 years after the National Health Insurance Scheme was officially introduced in the country, only three per cent of Nigerians have been covered.
This is, however, a far cry from its Ghanaian counterpart that started the same programme almost the same time but has covered 65 per cent of its population till date.
The Chief Executive Officer, Total Health Trust Limited, Dr. Ladi Awosika, disclosed this during the Nigerian-South African Chamber of Commerce monthly breakfast forum with the theme, “The role of health insurance in socio-economic development of Nigeria,” in Lagos.
Awosika said, “The health insurance scheme, which started in Ghana about the same time, now has 65 per cent of the total population covered, while in Nigeria, it is three per cent.”
Out of the three per cent, he said that the private sector covered only about 25 per cent of Nigerians captured under the scheme.
He blamed this setback on the industry’s inability to roll out all the five major programmes of the scheme, as only about two of them had been accomplished so far.
According to him, the scheme was kick-started in the public sector. While the federal public sector had enjoyed a large coverage, he said that the state and local government segments had yet to be fully explored.
A large proportion of the formal and informal private sector, he noted, had also not been covered under the scheme.
Former Health Minister, Prof. Eyitayo Lambo, was worried by the lack of continuity in government policies, which had retarded growth in the country.
While he was a minister, he had said, “We developed fantastic policies which could have boosted the health sector, but as soon as we left, all these ended.”
He stressed the role of health insurance in providing financial assistance against catastrophic health expenditure and improving the utilisation of health services by all socio economic growth
