By Hassan Zaggi
Following the signing into law of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) Bill, Senator Ibrabim Oloriegbe, has called on state governments to, as a matter of urgency, establish health insurance agencies to enable their citizens benefit from the new law.
He made the call at a media briefing in Abuja, yesterday.
“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.
Senator Oloriegbe who is the Chairman, Senate Committee on Health, said that apart from reducing to the barest minimum avoidable high rate of morbidity and mortality in the country, the Act it will also halt out-of-pocket health expenditure by Nigerians and its attendant consequences.
He said that the new Act will enable Nigerians 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 sector. By private, we mean individuals.
“Then, it was about 65% of out-of- pocket but now its about 70.5% 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 law maker said.
Senator Oloriegbe who sponsored the Bill and followed it through until it became a law applauded the World Health Organisation (WHO) for being instrumental to the passage of the Bill.
“Because we have structure in place, the WHO provided support for us to have leadership,” he stressed.
