The chief executive officer (CEO) of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), Dr Samuel Yaw Annor, has said that the Authority has largely paid the huge arrears left by the previous National Democratic Congress (NDC) government.
He said the immediate past government left over GH¢1.2 billion meant for service providers as at the end of 2016, and that because of the huge debt, most of them stopped providing services to the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) subscribers.
Speaking at the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Friday, Dr Annor explained that the current administration had paid most part of the debt, including this year’s commitment (up to March) and so the service providers had resumed services to NHIS card bearers who visit the hospitals.
The NHIA boss also indicated that his outfit had started paying contractors and that currently, it is indebted to contractors to the tune of GH¢300 million.
“Mr chairman we had about 11 million subscribers but that figure dwindled to 9.7 million because people who visited the hospitals and could not get ready health service refused to renew their subscription; but now because we have started paying the arrears, health service providers have been giving services to subscribers again and that the figure is now appreciating – indicating that hope has been restored in the NHIS,” he told the committee.
He said the Authority was putting in place stringent measure to ensure that all claims paid are meant for only services that have been provided to subscribers.
He indicated that in view of that, the NHIA had set up four central claim processing pools where all claims from service providers are processed and authenticated before payments are made.
Mr Annor noted that the time had come for the government to think of other innovative ways of funding the scheme since every year subscribers keep increasing.
He disclosed that the Authority had presented some proposals to the government and cabinet to consider, as a way of increasing funding for the sustenance of scheme.
He said for instance, the NHIS component of VAT could be increased from 2.5% to 3.5% or a small percentage of the oil revenue could be channeled into funding the health insurance scheme.
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