Sanwo-Olu urges residents to register for health insurance
Lagos state Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu on Wednesday made a passionate call to residents of the state to register for the health insurance scheme introduced by the government towards ensuring improved healthcare delivery.
Subscription to the scheme, Gov. Sanwo-Olu said would enable the government prioritise its healthcare programmes to enhance its quality and affordability by residents.
The governor made the call at the ongoing Medic West Africa Conference at the Eko Convention Centre, Victoria Island.
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Gov. Sanwo-Olu said the health insurance coverage must be scaled up as a condition to build the confidence of private investors in the scheme, which he said, is created to remove the burden on residents by providing affordable healthcare.
He said: “For health to be completely affordable and accessible, people must subscribe to our health insurance scheme, where we need to increase coverage in terms of registration. This is how developed countries are able to tackle their health financing and access.
“What it means is that everybody will not take ill at once. But, the financing process would be in a way that, anyone who needs it at any given time will have full access to it because such person contributed to the scheme.
“Also, the option of health facilities to be used by a subscriber would include private hospitals. All of these are brought out to make healthcare accessible and affordable.”
The governor also hinted that the state would start the process of revamping its road ambulance scheme, with the objective of creating more ambulance points across the state.
The overhaul, he pointed out, would include the deployment of emergency responders at each ambulance point to give palliative treatment to the injured before being transported to hospitals.
The governor added that his administration would not pay lip service to the upgrading of the state-owned specialist hospitals, adding that the primary healthcare centres were being strengthened to reduce pressure on the secondary health facilities.
Gov. Sanwo-Olu, who personally inspected the latest medical technology equipment exhibited at the event, said the government would be leveraging its Public Private Partnership (PPP) policy to acquire some of the advanced technologies displayed at the conference.
