Pregnant women and under-18s in southern communities of Burkina Faso close to Bongo in the Upper East region are trooping to the town for free maternal healthcare.
The women, mostly under 18 years of age, are taking advantage of the proximity to the town to enjoy Ghana’s Health Insurance by pretending to be Ghanaians.
According to the Bongo District Manager of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), Clement Agana Ayamga, even though the laws of Ghana forbids outsiders from registering in the Health Insurance Scheme, these Burkinabé women with the support of some citizens of Bongo manage to get themselves registered.
“For the free maternal policy that is currently going on, we have pregnant women from Burkina who pretend that they are Ghanaians and register free and get their cards and attend hospital free," he said.
As a measure to stem the tide of health tourists, the NHIA asked the pregnant women to bring their voters ID card anytime they want to register but that too came with its own challenge because most of the pregnant women are below 18 and did not have voters ID.
“So we still are not able to tell whether they are Ghanaians or Burkinabés,” he lamented.
