World Health Day: Edo HIP, Insurance Scheme’ll improve access to healthcare for all, says Obaseki

The Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, has assured that the Edo Health Improvement Programme (Edo-HIP) and Edo Health Insurance Scheme will improve access to quality and affordable healthcare services for all residents in the state.

The governor gave the assurance in commemoration of World Health Day, celebrated every April 7, to mark the founding of the World Health Organisation (WHO).

According to Obaseki, “As we mark the World Health Day, especially at a time the world is recovering from the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, we are pushing on with the reforms in the health sector so as to improve access to quality and affordable healthcare services to all residents in the state.

He said, “Under the Edo Health Improvement Programme, we have remodeled over fifty Primary Healthcare Centres in rural communities across the 18 local governments in the state to improve access to quality and affordable healthcare at the local level.

“We have continued manpower training and have provided health workers with the much-needed incentives to provide top-of-the-range care in our facilities.”

On the World Health Day 2021 theme ‘Building a fairer, healthier world’, Obaseki said, “We have continued enrollment of civil servants, traders and vulnerable persons to benefit from the Edo Health Insurance Scheme (Edo-HIS) designed to provide all-inclusive, affordable and quality healthcare services for all, irrespective of social condition, economic status and location.”

“Our target is to capture no fewer than one million persons as beneficiaries of Edo-HIS by the end of the year 2021, while about 50 percent of residents in the state would have enrolled for the scheme by the year 2024,” the governor said.

The man after Edo people's heart