A lawyer, Dr Raymond Atugubah, says the National Health Insurance Scheme risks premature collapse under its current legislative management and administrative structure.

According to him, Act 650, which established the institutional framework of the scheme, needs to be repealed as it contains many loopholes inhibiting the smooth operation of the scheme.

Dr Atuguba said this when he presented a policy review document on the NHIS at a legislative review stakeholders meeting on Wednesday at Sogakope.

The one day meeting brought together medical and legal practitioners, NHIS officials, labour, traditional health practitioners, pharmacists, employers and development partners from the Greater Accra, Volta and Central regions.

The meeting was the last of such regional meetings to invite broader stakeholder inputs into NHIS bill.

Dr Atuguba said Article 650 created a dichotomy on the role of the National Health Insurance Authority over the District Mutual Health Schemes, which by their establishment are autonomous, thus, creating problems such as the inability to check fraud and other issues in the district.

He said though the scheme registers about 50 percent of Ghanaians at a time, it fails to address issues of growth in health infrastructure development and management of personnel and additional health staff creating problems similar to the cash and carry system.

Dr Atuguba, a law lecturer at the University of Ghana, proposed a National Insurance Commission instead of an Authority, a fund manager for the scheme and a legislator to be in charge of legislations and bye-laws.

However, Chief Executive of NHIS Authority, Mr Sylvester Mensah, said in an address read for him that the Authority was taking initiatives including improvement in the ICT system, procedure and policy standardization, strengthening human capital and improvement in monitoring and evaluation.


Source: GNA