Thursday, October 17, 2024 - The government of President William Ruto bowed to pressure from faith-based institutions and pledged to clear all the debt owed to them after they threatened to scale down on the services that they offer over unpaid medical claims from the defunct National Hospital Insurance Fund(NHIF) amounting to Ksh7 billion.
The protests to deny the full
boarding of the new Social Health Insurance Fund (SHIF) emerged during a
meeting convened by Kenya’s faith-based health institutions that include the
Christian Health Association of Kenya (CHAK), the Kenya Conference of Catholic
Bishops (KCCB), and the Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims (SUPKEM).
The Ministry of Health was thus
forced to backtrack and act to assure the faith-based institutions that their
concerns would be addressed to avoid a cripple on the health system as they
play an important role in complementing other health facilities available in
the country.
Medical Services Principal
Secretary Harry Kimtai revealed that the government will pay Ksh1.5 billion
owed to health facilities this week and another Ksh3 billion will be cleared
next week bringing the total owed amount to Ksh4.5 billion.
The Ministry also revealed that
it will establish a committee to oversee the payment process to ensure that it
achieves the process of clearing the arrears owed to the health institutions.
This happened even as the
Ministry admitted that the NHIF liabilities will now be transferred to the new
Social Health Authority (SHA).
It added that the new scheme is
now having a fully digitised claims portal, making it easy for the affected
institutions to lodge their claims.
The Kenyan DAILY POST
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