Bayelsa Health Insurance Scheme Saves over N2Billion – Agadah

                                  By Ma-Gens Inegba

The Bayelsa Health Insurance Scheme established two years ago says it has saved over N2Billion to sustain the programme in the state. 

Dr Zuoboemi Agadah, the Executive Secretary of the programme disclosed this in Yenagoa at a 4 Day Symposium/Training organized by BHIS in collaboration with the Scheme Healthcare technical partners for Board members, workers and healthcare providers under scheme among others.

Dr Zuoboemi Agadah, the Executive Secretary, BHIS.

 

The theme of the 4 Day programme was tagged “The New Concepts in Health Insurance on Informal Sector Social Health Insurance, Standard and Quality Assurance, Risk Management and Claims Management and Fraud Detection.”

The Executive Secretary highlighted the different operations the programme had, pointing out that since September 2017 till date, BHIS has taken care of 274,631 enrollees, despite the challenges it encountered in August, September, October, November and December within the period under review.

According to him the BHIS has taking care of 48,585 secondary cases that needed admission.

 This apart, BHIS have paid for surgeries for 1,771 enrollees, noting that Bayelsa state has the lowest maternal mortality in the whole of South South as at this year 2019.

Explaining on the over N2Billion saved under the scheme, Dr Agadah said the scheme was running at a profit and presently had N1.8billion under its management which comprised equity contribution from Bayelsa Government and deductions from enrollees.
 According to him, so far, the fund had earned a profit of N260 million, stressing that having achieved the purpose of the scheme at the public sector participation, the next phase of growth was the private sector.

The participants of the  BHIS programme.

He further disclosed that BHIS has registered a total of 113,843 public servants within the past two years of operation.

The executive secretary said that the scheme had begun the enrolment of private sector beneficiaries as a means of achieving universal health insurance coverage, pointing out that the BHIS law has made health insurance mandatory for all residents.

Dr Kazeem Mustapha, Executive Director, United Healthcare, the Health Management Organisation (HMO) of the scheme, said that it was already a success and had enhanced the health index of Bayelsa.

Mustapha urged the BHIS management to consolidate on the gains from the public service sector by focusing on the private sector.

Earlier in his opening remarks the Head of Department on Human Resources, Mr Glasgow Akaranbiriowei said since the inception of the scheme the present leadership has been organizing programmes that would enhance the actualization of its statutory responsibilities to achieve set goals.

Personalities present at the event are the Board Chairperson, Prof Onyaye Kunle Obwu, John Ndiomu and Tari Duonana among others.