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Health, Andile Tshuma
Being sick is becoming expensive and dying is even more expensive such that giving a loved one a decent send off is now beyond reach.
A trip to the pharmacy can give you a serious case of sticker shock. The rise of drug prices is outpacing all other areas of healthcare spending and if you have medical aid cover, you still have to contend with paying hefty amounts in shortfalls despite the high monthly subscriptions.
Last month, Premier Service Medical Aid Society subscribers, most of them civil servants, woke up to a shocker when the service provider announced an 80 percent tariff increase.
This week, Nyaradzo Funeral Services added salt to injury by increasing its premiums. It is difficult to live without medical and funeral cover but most workers are left with almost nothing after medical aid and funeral cover deductions.
It seems medical aid service providers and funeral insurance companies are competing as evidenced by their constant hiking of tariffs.
Universal health coverage is one of the targets for the achievement of the sustainable development goals by 2030.
PSMAS, which operates clinics and pharmacies across the country through its subsidiary PSMI, has an estimated 800 000 members, most of them civil servants.
Public Service Commission secretary, Mr Jonathan Wutawunashe, said treasury granted the upward review with effect from August 1 this year.
PSMAS has over the past few years faced various operational challenges forcing most medical service providers to demand cash from PSMAS members as the health insurer was failing to pay for services rendered to its members.
Some of the challenges faced by PSMAS were as a result of failure to recover on time, amounts due to it particularly from Government which owed it more than $100 million by March last year.
The 80 percent review on the main plan scheme will increase the subscription to $67,50 which translates to the member and first beneficiary paying $13,50 each while Government will contribute $54 using the 20:80 ratio.
The health cover is becoming prohibitive given salaries of most workers yet the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being regardless of one’s race, religion, political belief, economic or social status.
The right to health for all people means that everyone should have access to health services.
The Zimbabwe Medical Association (ZIMA) has raised concern over services offered by medical health insurers who are said to be top heavy resultng in them spending more on workers’ salaries and other expenses while members incur exorbitant shortfalls.
The situation is even worse for the unemployed who do not have medical aid.
Although Government scrapped the multi-currency system, some health care service providers still nicodemously demand forex payments or peg their fees against the greenback.
Government must prioritise the health sector in foreign currency allocation in order to bring sanity and stability in the pricing of medications and for the revitalisation of public health institutions to enable them to cater for everyone.
Health and Child Care Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo recently said Government had revived plans to establish a National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) in an effort to make universal health coverage a reality.
Dr Moyo said Government was looking forward to have the NHIS established by January next year saying this was in line with Government’s efforts to improve access to health care for ordinary Zimbabweans.
“We have already started working on the NHIS, our plans are already well advanced. We are working together with the Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare. This has been on the ground for the past 15 years, but we want to make sure that we get the NHIS established so that we can be able to provide universal health coverage. The consultants working on it have already done their initial investigations and have come up with a document. As per recommendation of that investigation we have now set up a special steering committee. We want to see the NHIS taking off by January next year,” said Dr Moyo.
The Minister said universal health coverage in Zimbabwe was going to be a reality because of operationalisation of the NHIS.
World Health Organisation’s country representative Dr Alex Gasasira at a meeting held recently, said while Zimbabwe had made progress towards universal health coverage in preventive areas such as HIV, more needed to be done to address access availability issues.
He said WHO, working closely with technical and funding partners, was working towards accelerating support to countries to re-align their health services and consider strategic shifts to achieve universal health coverage.
Dr Gasasira commended Zimbabwe’s aspirations of becoming an upper middle economy by 2030 through a number of reforms enunciated in the Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) which puts human development and universal health coverage and access as an important component. “The TSP includes priority strategies and activities aimed at achieving equitable coverage and enhanced quality of health delivery, all of which are in line with universal health coverage and primary health care,” he said. — @andile_tshuma
Online Reporter