By Jane Meza
Mombasa County, Kenya: The Ministry of Health has reported significant progress in transitioning to the Social Health Authority (SHA), with over 12.7 million Kenyans currently registered.
This figure includes former National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) members who have been seamlessly shifted to the new system.
According to Health Principal Secretary Harry Kimtai, a notable number of beneficiaries have yet to add their dependents, limiting their access to the full range of healthcare services.
Speaking in Mombasa, where he was meeting with the county commissioner together with the CSs of health from the coastal region PS emphasized that registering dependents is crucial for ensuring access to healthcare at government and faith-based facilities, which have already signed contracts to provide services.
“This is the first meeting of its kind and we are going to continue with other regions. we decided to start with coastal regions and so far 13,60,000 Kenyans have registered for Social Health Authority the number is still going up and we want by December every Kenyan has register.” Said PS Kimtai.
He reassured Kenyans that SHA self-registration is an ongoing process, that is available through a USSD code or the SHA website, ensuring that primary care, emergency services, and specialized treatments like cancer care are available to all registered members.
“We at the national level and social health authority we are going to support them to continue with the rollout at their counties, we’ve also agreed to form the counties implementation committees that will support the rollout of social health authority out of this is going to be cascaded to sub-county level, to the ward level and down to the location level.” Stated Kimtai.
Despite some initial challenges with the electronic claims system, the Ministry has addressed these issues, ensuring that claims and patient verifications under the previous NHIF system are still being managed efficiently. A joint committee will also be set up to verify pending bills, particularly for patients admitted before the transition.
“We have agreed on a structure that will be used for reporting, we have agreed that the community health promotors and village elders will go to every household to ensure that all the households are registered because we realized that most of the households are not registered and we have trained the CHPs for assisted registration for those who do not have phones and cannot access the phones and cyber cafes will be able to register from their homes and households, PS Kirui concluded.
In this phase, private and faith-based hospitals have committed to maintaining services as contracts are finalized, to ensure that no SHA beneficiary experiences service disruptions during this critical transition period.
This comes after the Mashujaa Day celebrations in Kwale County, President William Ruto underscored the government’s commitment to enhancing access to affordable healthcare through the newly launched Social Health Authority (SHA).
He emphasized that SHA will revolutionize healthcare access, ensuring that every Kenyan, regardless of their socio-economic status, receives quality medical services. Ruto reassured Kenyans that SHA would replace the defunct NHIF, addressing the shortcomings of the previous system and extending healthcare coverage to millions more citizens.
“SHA is part of a broader strategy to ensure healthcare becomes a basic right, accessible to every Kenyan”. Said the President.
