The Government, through the Ministry of Finance, has
paid GHc100 million as part payment of arrears owed National Health
Insurance Scheme (NHIS) service, providers.
This follows the Private Health Facilities Association of Ghana’s threat
to partially withdraw its services if government fail to pay the nine
months to claim arrears.
Mr Frank-Torblu Richard, General Secretary of the Private Health
Facilities Association of Ghana, told the GNA in an interview in Accra
on Friday that the GHC100 million part-payment paid by the Government
was meant for both public and private health facilities.
It was left with GHc50 million arrears to be paid.
Last Tuesday, April 5, the Private Health Facilities Association of
Ghana held a news conference and demanded that the Government of Ghana
release funds to NHIA for immediate payment of claims to the healthcare
service providers of all arrears up to the month of December 2021.
The request included outstanding payments owed from some health
facilities for the period 2017 to 2020.
The association demanded also that the Government reinstated the
collection of toll levy and direct any revenue realised to support the
Free Senior High School programme to reduce the virement or
administrative transfer of NHIS levy revenue for other payments.
It demanded that the National Health Insurance Authority expedited the
review of the medicine and service tariffs to reflect current market
variables to enable health facilities to provide expected healthcare as
envisioned by the NHIA.
And that, the Review Committee of the NHIA should have a fair
representation from the Private Health Facilities Association to
guarantee the quality of the review outcome.
“We request for a formal engagement with the Ministry of Health and the
various health facility regulators to review/amend the credentialing
threshold on staffing requirements and the possible allocation to health
staff to private facilities,” it said.
It said failure on the part of the Authority to comply with the set
timelines, would not hesitate to partially withdraw services and that
NHIS clients will have to pay the full cost of drugs covered under the
scheme to NHIS clients nationwide as a strategy for survival in these
tough times.
“From our candid perspective on recent happenings with the scheme,
Private Health Facilities Association of Ghana whose members are some of
the biggest beneficiaries of the scheme portend doom as we can
confidently confirm without a doubt that the National Health Insurance
Scheme finds itself in a precarious situation and in a serious state of
financial distress that needs an immediate lifeline if it will survive
as the only healthcare intervention serving the people of Ghana,” the
Association said.
By Godwill Arthur-Mensah, GNA
