Regional News of Friday, 11 June 2004

Source: GNA

Funding health delivery services, major problem for governments - DCE

Bole, (NR), June 11, GNA - The Bole District Chief Executive, Alhaji Sulemana Adams Achanso has said funding health delivery services to increase access had been a major problem for governments all over the world.

He said it was for this reason that the government had taken a bold decision to implement the National Health Insurance Scheme to make healthcare delivery accessible to the people.

Alhaji Achanso was speaking at a stakeholders meeting to implement the District Health Insurance Scheme at Bole on Friday Health workers, traditional rulers, assembly and unit committee members, NGOs, opinion leaders, youth and women's groups and heads of decentralized departments attended the forum.

The DCE said, while it was impossible for some governments to subsidise the cost of health care delivery, it was equally difficult for the poor in society to contribute their portion of the cost at the point of accessing health.

He said the National Health Insurance Scheme was established to increase access to health care delivery for the people, especially the vulnerable groups who were limited to accessing health care under the "cash and carry" regime.

He said the National Health Insurance Scheme would assist the people in the communities to pool resources to help one another in times of illness.

Alhaji Achanso said a lot of work had been done towards the implementation of the scheme in the district to ensure its successful take off in the area.

He announced that the government had released 250 million cedis to the assembly as seed money for the implementation of the scheme in the district.