From right: Samuel Boateng Arthur, Executive Director of Clickgold, George Osei Bimpeh, Executive Director of Send Ghana, and Leonard Shang Quartey, a member of ISODEC, addressing the media
The Universal Access to Healthcare Campaign (UAHCC) has called for the strengthening of the community health and planning service (CHPS) compounds in the areas of financing, service delivery by skilled health staff, supervision and monitoring and disease control.
The non-governmental organisation, addressing the press at a meeting to commemorate the Universal Health Day marked on December 12, stated that the country can attain the Universal Healthcare Coverage (UHC) if it strengthens the aforementioned components of the CHPS and National Health Insurance Scheme; the strategies the country has adopted to achieve UHC.
“For Ghana to achieve UHC, several factors must be in place including, a system for financing health service so people do not suffer financial hardship when using them, a sufficient capacity of well-trained, motivated health workers to provide the services to meet patients’ needs and availability of essential medicines and technologies and diagnose and treat medical problems,” Archibald Adams, National Campaign Coordinator of UAHCC, said.
Reading the campaign’s statement, Mr Adams said the campaign sees the NHIS as a vehicle to achieving UHC in Ghana, but the issue of delayed release of funds was hindering the progress of the gains achieved so far.
“As we speak, there are some health facilities whose claims are in arrears of seven months and more. As a matter of urgency, we ask the Ministry of Finance to release funds to the NHIA so that these health facilities can be paid,” he said.
He said the current national coverage rate of the NHIS is 41 percent. However, Mr Adams pointed out that more was needed to be done to enable citizens to reach the WHO standard target of 90 percent of the entire population.
George Osei Bimpeh, a member of the Primary Healthcare Advocacy Coalition, presenting a statement on UHC, also indicated that the lack of adequate resource, including essential drugs and equipment for the over 4,000 CHPS compounds in the country has the potential to cripple the strategy that is reaching people in rural areas with primary healthcare.
“We call on government to prioritise primary healthcare delivery across the country by ensuring the functionality of all CHPS compound, equipping the compounds with requisite human resources,” he said.
The campaign later pledged their readiness to work hand-in-hand with government, with particular reference to the government of the President-elect Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and the New Patriotic Party (NPP) till Ghana achieves UHC.
By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri