Chioma Umeha
Dr Olusola Akande, Executive Secretary of Oyo State Health
Insurance Agency (OYSHIA), has called for increased awareness among Oyo
citizens on social health insurance programme in the State to enable them to
embrace the scheme.
Akande said adequate sensitisation on the importance and
benefits of health insurance are required for the programme to really gain
ground sufficiently.
The health insurance agency boss spoke at a media dialogue
on improving access and uptake healthcare for marginalised women and children
in Oyo State which was organised by Oyo State Ministry of Information in
collaboration with OYSHIA and the United Nation Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
According to him, the agency has recorded 100,000 enrollees
in the last 18 months of its operations and that it targets was to hit 450,000
to cover five percent of the population of the state before June.
He listed the efforts of the agency aimed at providing
quality healthcare services for the people of the state without experiencing
catastrophic health expenditure.
He also said, no fewer than 100 pregnant women in the state
have delivered through Caesarean Section (CS) done under the health insurance
scheme and that thousands of residents of the State have benefited from the
scheme.
He was worried that many people are still unaware of the
activities of OYSHIA and sought the support of the media to propagate the
importance of health insurance to the people so that more people would enroll
in the scheme.
Akande said OYSHIA has been rated very high in terms of
performance and assured that the agency would not relent in making sure that
the people of the state enjoy quality healthcare without expending their entire
savings on medical bills.
Contributing, Mr. Rotimi Babalola, Director, Press and
Public Relations, Oyo State Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism, praised UNICEF for its efforts in ensuring
the wellbeing of children and women.
Mrs. Blessing Ejiofor, UNICEF Communication Specialist, in
her remarks said access to quality healthcare is a right of every child and
charged the media to assist in reporting issues that would prompt the
policymakers to take proactive steps and implement policies that would make life
better for children, women and other vulnerable groups.
She explained that the objective of the dialogue was to
create an opportunity for media advocacy on increasing access and uptake of
healthcare services for children and venerable populations through the health
insurance scheme using Oyo State Health Insurance Agency (OYSHIA) as a case
study.
Ejiofor said the initiative was also designed to provide
media partners with the knowledge and material that would assist them to
understand the issues, advocate and report health insurance scheme to create
more awareness of it and encourage more people to enroll in the scheme.
Similarly, Dr Adebola Hassan, UNICEF Health Specialist and
other experts in their various presentations dwelled on the importance and benefits
of health insurance and stressed the need to attain Universal Health Coverage
(UHC) and ensure good health for the citizens.
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