Health Insurance: We Won’t Hesitate To Prosecute Erring Health Facilities, NHIA Vows  

The National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) has vowed to prosecute any erring hospital or pharmaceutical company that undermines the workings of the health insurance scheme.

 

Bode Adeleke,  the Acting Coordinator of  NHIA in Ogun made this assertion at a one-day sensitisation workshop for stakeholders in Abeokuta.

According to Adeleke, the new NHIA Act gives the agency more power and coverage to sanction and prosecute erring stakeholders.

Adeleke also mentioned that the agency had battled with fake drugs in the recent past hence the resolve to sanction or prosecute any facility found culpable. 

He said fake drugs had made enrollees question the efficacy of some drugs presented to them at health facilities.

 Adeleke also revealed that the authority would come out with its own branded drugs in order to address the issue of generic and branded drugs often encountered at the health facilities.

 “We have a new idea in the aspect of drug production. In the past, people have had problems with the perception of drugs. 

“They complain about the efficacy of drugs and the services rendered in hospitals.

 “We can close down erring hospitals, pharmaceuticals or stand-alone providers like opticians or ophthalmologists.

“We can regulate them now, close them partially or totally. But before now, we cannot do that because we didn’t have the regulatory power,” Adeleke said. 

The NHIA coordinator added that the new Act also presented an opportunity to enrol virtually everybody, especially the vulnerable in society.

He further stated that health insurance remains the key to universal health coverage more over as the Federal Government will foot the bills.

 Some of the stakeholders at the workshop enjoined the government to aggressively sensitise the public on the need for them to key into the scheme under the new authority.

Director of Health, Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAAB), Dr Abiodun Amusan, urged the authority to as a matter of urgency reach out to stakeholders to key into the scheme.

 He said that many workers were yet to enrol for the scheme, with the argument that the federal government promised them free healthcare at the point of entry.

 “Some of them have refused to enrol in the health insurance scheme. Some hide under their spouses to enjoy the scheme without paying a dime from their salaries.

“There is a need to do something about it,” Amusan said.

 According to the News Agency of Nigeria, NHIA hitherto referred to as National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) was changed and signed into law by an Act in May, thus repealing the 2004 Act of the NHIS.