MY DREAM IS TO BEQUEATH TO ‘NDI- ANAMBRA’ AN AFFORDABLE HEATH INSURANCE SCHEME – ONYEMAECHI

The Management of Anambra State Health Insurance Agency has vowed to descend heavily on any of its erring healthcare Providers in the State for breach of service agreement signed with them before now.

The Executive Secretary of the Agency, Dr Simeon Beluonwu Onyemaechi, made the vow in his office in Awka during a Press interview, saying that the Agency could today boost the establishment of over two hundred and fifty (250) health Insurance facilities in various communities across the State.

Dr Onyemaechi warned the beneficiaries of the Scheme in the State to stop inferring with the process(s) of the Agency whenever they want to punish the erring hospitals in the State for fallen Short of the established norms and regulations guiding the service prescriptions of the Agency in the State by telling them to temper justice with mercy.

He maintained that our people must work towards getting to a point where they should know what their rights are and enforce them collectively as their human rights, informing all that in 1948 that the UN charter had moved the issue(s) about health to become a fundamental human right to protect them at any time of crisis.

While calling on Ndi- Anambra to embrace the State Health Insurance Scheme to cut out of their out of pocket health expenditure in the State, he laments that the people are dying astronomically from avoidable death in the society today.
He noted that the Agency has not gotten to where it wants to be in terms of providing both formal and informal healthcare delivery to the people, adding that the Agency was targeting to register about One Million enrollees in the Scheme as against the present One hundred and fifty thousand enrollees in the State.

The ASHIA boss, who observed that the crisis with governance in the African content was that the people have powerful individuals and not powerful institutions, reaffirmed the decision of the Management of the Agency to bequeath the Ndi-Anambra a powerful Health insurance Scheme that everybody should be proud of of of anywhere in the Country and the World at large.

Dr Onyemaechi, who is also a Special Adviser to Governor Willie Obiano on Health, challenged the health-seeking behaviours of our people, stressing that our people must be meant to understand the need for them to have quality and accessible healthcare delivery without financial barrier anytime and anywhere in the State.

He attributed the successful results recorded in the State so far by the Agency to the deliberate attempt, vision and the structures put in place by the resilient Staff and Management of the Agency so that the people can reach them at any time through their twenty – four hours feedback mechanism in the State.

The Medical expert, who spoke further, stated that the Agency was committed to achieving the Universal Health Coverage as enshrined in the Sustainable Development Goal three(3)by 2050, through a functional and institutionalized Health Insurance Scheme in the State, advising the affluents in the State to be courageous enough to pay for the Health Insurance of the less privileged around them so that they would be able to benefit from the largesse offered by the Scheme in the State.

He, however, commended Governor Obiano’s political will in setting up the Agency and backing it up with the law, which according to him known as Anambra State Health Insurance Scheme Law,2016, which he said also further entrenched the Agency in the fabrics of governance in the State perpetually, just like the National Health Service in the United Kingdom.
RPT: Obiorah Anthony.