Dr. Bernard Okoe Boye flanked by some Directors of the Authority
THE National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) in its bid to enhance transparency in the payment of claims to health facilities has launched the Sunshine Policy.
The policy is expected to publish payments made to health facilities under the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) on the Authority’s website and made available to service providers.
Some selected organisations such as the teaching hospitals, regional hospitals, Ghana Health Service, Pharmaceutical Society of Ghana, Ghana Registered Midwives Association, Pharmaceutical Importers and Wholesalers Association of Ghana and other bodies and service providers can easily check and verify when money is paid, under the new policy.
“This is a crucial policy to ensure that anybody dealing with hospitals will know that something is going to them,” NHIS Chief Executive, Dr. Bernard Okoe-Boye, said at the launch of the policy in Accra.
He said the new policy was to take away the secrecy associated with NHIA’s payments relating to service providers.
He added that not even the suppliers of medicines that were given to patients knew when and how payments were made, adding that “this is a crucial policy to ensure that anybody dealing with hospitals will know that something is going to them”.
He explained that it would eliminate instances where service providers would tell the media and their suppliers that for close to one year, they had not received money from the NHIA.
“We now have a link on our website where all the players in the health sector have access to what we have paid, when we paid the money, and for what we paid them,” he added.
The NHIA CEO acknowledged that although the agreed period for payments to be made after submission was two months, it had shot up to seven months and gave the assurance that the Authority was liaising with the Ministry of Finance to clear the arrears.
“With the collaboration we are having with the Ministry of Finance, by the end of this year, I have the strong faith that the era where some hospitals are owed up to 12 months will be history”, he added.
By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri