Under the umbrella’s veil.
Health insurance in Kenya has been strained for many years, due to the preeminence of factors like fraud, low income levels among the key consuming publics, cost of health care, lack of knowledge on medical insurance and a cumbersome claim settlement procedure. At a century when it’s need is so defined, medical insurance providers ought to develop affordable products to avoid locking out many would-be clients who cannot afford to pay costly premiums.
No one plans to get sick or hurt, but most people need medical care at some point. Because of the uncertainty in when one will get sick or hurt, the idea of health insurance was coined so it would help wrap these costs or offer one a variety of other benefits relating to someone’s pursuit for health.
Truly speaking, the idea of health insurance has despite the great advancements in healthcare not been we’ll adopted and has been secluded as a thing for people working in the formal sector. People who are not in any formal employment in Kenya don’t consider the incentives that spending on an health insurance scheme would bring. However, cumulatively, if a country is able to scale up its measures and have all people registered under such schemes it facilitates access to care for countless citizens, resulting in lower death rates and better health care outcomes. On a basic level, health insurance can mean the difference between sickness and health or even life and death.
Healthy people and young adults may feel they don’t need health insurance, believing it is an expense they can forgo because they are rarely sick and have never spent a day in the hospital. But accidents and illnesses can happen to any of us at any time. Without health insurance, we are responsible for covering all of our medical costs, putting us at severe financial risk.
Health insurance links people to a regular source of care, giving them access to an infrastructure and a network of providers who are able to work with patients in delivering comprehensive, continuous and coordinated health care services. Ultimately, people can live longer, healthier lives because of access to ongoing care. Most health care plans offer preventive services, providing many vaccinations and screenings at no cost, thus preventing illnesses and ensuing complications.
Unlike what many Kenya’s assume having an insurance covers preexisting conditions in the case that if you have a diagnosis before you enroll, you’ll still qualify for health benefits. With health insurance, it is much easier for both the patient and provider to focus on prevention and wellness as well as the management of acute and chronic illnesses, leading to better health outcomes and lower costs.
Universal health coverage.
Universal health coverage in Kenya is where the whole population has access to appropriate, promotive, preventive, curative and rehabilitative health care when they need it and at an affordable cost. In the country it’s flagship which happened nearly a decade ago, was to attain two goals, the first being financial risk protection and the second, access to needed care. Yet it also includes objectives related to equity in access, quality services and broader social protection.
Health insurance has currently been utilized as a mechanism for promoting progress to universal health coverage (UHC) in Kenya. However the goal is still several inches away from it’s fruition, as some people still deem it as a new concept introduced by the government to swindle them and immerse them in deeper financial voids. However even the stakeholders are stupefied on how they modify the scheme so it can become more appealing to the Kenyans working in the informal sectors and who arguably form the biggest cohort of unregistered Kenyans. In this light, the government is seeking exclusivity to see how the scheme can cater for larger citizens. The efforts have yielded minimal results though it’s not wavering in it’s devotion to accomplish the UHC goal regardless of the slow pace.
Given that remote communities are now the priority of most insurance schemes, as insurance firms are working to see how they lure them in, Kenyans should understand the implications of health financing reforms and their preferred design features considered, to ensure acceptability and sustainability. For this, it will be of great value that communities are educated and engaged to ensure that the NHIS is acceptable to the population it serves mainly by eradicating the misleading perceptions and educating many Kenyans on it’s unseen value.
However the insurance problem is widespread and plagues many African countries alongside Kenya. But still, to sprout a first-paced African continent, the governments themselves should consider how they rehabilitate their health care systems to provide effective financial risk protection for all, as part of universal health coverage (UHC). The 75th World Health Assembly which happened last year, urged member states to “ensure that health-financing systems introduce or develop prepayment of financial contributions for the health sector, with a view to sharing risk among the population and avoiding catastrophic health-care expenditure and impoverishment of individuals as a result of seeking care”. Following on this call, the World Health Report for 2019 focused on UHC and identified the important role played by health systems financing in making progress towards this goal. And in 2021, the World Health Assembly re-emphasized the urgency of implementing sustainable health financing structures and the need to monitor progress towards achieving UHC. Several other initiatives have been put forward to support progress towards UHC.
By collaborating with health care providers, medical insurance providers could negotiate cheaper health care costs for their members. Medical insurance providers should carry out marketing campaigns and should also open more branches in rural towns so as create more awareness on medical insurance and its benefits. Insurers should also introduce discounts for clients with few claims to encourage prudent usage of medical covers which are often misused resulting to increased costs.
ManagersMag 