By Adedapo Adesanya
Senator Ibrahim Oloriegbe has called on state governments to, as a matter of urgency, establish health insurance agencies to enable residents of their respective states to benefit from the new law.
He made the call at a media briefing in Abuja as part of calls to drive the spread of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) Act recently signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari.
“The signing of the health insurance Act makes it mandatory for all Nigerians to benefit from health insurance. It is now left for states to establish state health insurance schemes for their citizens to benefit from the service,” he said.
Mr Oloriegbe, who is the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, said that apart from reducing to the barest minimum avoidable high rate of morbidity and mortality in the country, the law will also halt out-of-pocket health expenditure by Nigerians and its attendant consequences.
He said that the new regulation will enable Nigerians to have access to qualitative and affordable health care as health insurance has become mandatory in Nigeria.
Enumerating the benefits of the new Act, the lawmaker said that it will help Nigeria in attaining Universal Health Coverage (UHC).
“So, the motivation is your best able to ensure that Nigeria attains Universal Health Coverage. But why do we have to do that? The financing of the health sector now is from two main sources, the public and private sectors. By private, we mean individuals.
“Then, it was about 65 per cent of out-of-pocket but now it is about 70.5 per cent based on the last National Health accounts studies.
“What it means is that out of every N100 that is spent on health, N70 is from individual pockets and that is not possible, not sustainable and not feasible in the long term. The resultant of that is that people die from curable and treatable illnesses because of lack of money,” the federal lawmaker said.
Mr Oloriegbe, who sponsored the bill and followed it through until it became a law, applauded the World Health Organisation (WHO) for being instrumental in its passage.
“Because we have the structure in place, the World Health Organisation (WHO) provided support for us to have leadership,” he stressed.
Aduragbemi Omiyale