Government has revived plans to establish National Health
Insurance Scheme in an effort to make universal health coverage a reality,
Health and Child Care Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo has said.
Speaking during belated World Health Day commemorations in
Harare yesterday, Dr Moyo said Government was looking forward to have the NHIS
established by January next year.
He said this was in line with Government’s efforts to
improving access to health care for ordinary Zimbabweans, which coincides with
this year’s theme for the world health day: “Universal Health Coverage:
Everyone, Everywhere, Every time.”
“We have already started working on the NHIS, our plans are
already well advanced. We are working together with the Ministry of Public
Service, Labour and Social Welfare.
“This has been on the ground for the past 15 years, but we
want to make sure that we get the NHIS established so that we can be able to
provide universal health coverage,” said Dr Moyo.
He said Government was looking forward to have set up the
scheme by January 2020.
“The consultants working on it have already done their
initial investigations and have come up with a document. As per recommendation
of that investigation we have now set up a special steering committee. We want
to see the NHIS taking off by January next year,” said Dr Moyo.
He said universal health coverage in Zimbabwe was going to
be a reality because of operationalisation of the NHIS.
He said the other existing medical aid societies will
complement the NHIS by providing cover to those who can afford.
“The existing schemes, the medical aid societies will also
play a major role and they continue to play major role because they provide
cover to people who have the financial capability to access services from
higher levels, but we are now looking at the general population,” said Dr Moyo.
The World Health Day commemorations is held every 7th of
April each year. This year’s theme focused on advantages of universal health
coverage. Universal health coverage is one of the targets for the achievement
of the sustainable development goals by 2030.
Speaking at the same occasion, World Health Organisation’s
country representative Dr Alex Gasasira said while Zimbabwe had made progress
towards universal health coverage in preventive areas such as HIV, more needed
to be done to address access availability issues.
He said WHO, working closely with technical and funding
partners, was working towards accelerating support to countries to re-align
their health services and consider strategic shifts to achieve universal health
coverage.
Dr Gasasira commended Zimbabwe’s aspirations of becoming an
upper middle economy by 2030 through a number of reforms enunciated in the
Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP).
“An important component of the TSP is human development.
“The TSP includes priority strategies and activities aimed
at achieving equitable coverage and enhanced quality of health delivery, all of
which are in line with universal health coverage and primary health care,” he
said. Herald
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