NHIA’s GHC800m indebtedness to CHAG 'compromising' rural health delivery – GPCC

The Ghana Pentecostal and Charismatic Council (GPCC) has said the failure by the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) “to reimburse claims submitted by the Christian Health Association of Ghana (CHAG) member facilities across Ghana for over nine months, amounting to more than GHS800,000,000” has “compromised the quality of healthcare delivery in rural Ghana where most of our mission health facilities are located”.

In a communiqué issued by the GPCC after deliberations at the 2020 Conference of Heads of Churches and Organisations held at the Pentecost Convention Centre, Gomoa Fetteh from 4 to 7 February 2020, the Council said: “While these health facilities have run out of essential medicines and other consumables owing to the refusal of pharmaceutical companies to supply medicines, ECG and NEDCo are threatening to cut electricity supply to these health facilities as a result of the NHIS indebtedness”.

“The Council is, therefore, calling on the government, through the Ministries of Finance and Health, the NHIS to, as a matter of urgency, take steps to reimburse all CHAG member facilities to avert their imminent closure in the next few days”, the communiqué added.

It noted: “The consequences of such closures, we are aware, could be quite grave for our healthcare delivery system, especially in the rural and hard-to-reach areas of our country where most of these mission health facilities are located”.

CHAG is a network organisation of 302 health facilities and health training institutions owned by 25 different Christian church denominations. It provides healthcare to the most vulnerable and underprivileged population groups in all 16 regions of Ghana, particularly the most remote areas.