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"Ghana's National Health Insurance: insights from members, administrators, and health care providers" in Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved

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"Ghana's National Health Insurance: insights from members, administrators, and health care providers" in Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved

The Ghana National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) was established as part of a poverty reduction strategy to make health care more affordable to Ghanaians. It is envisaged that it will eventually replace the existing cash-and-carry system. This paper examines the views of NHIS administrators, members/enrollees, and health care providers on how the Scheme operates in practice. It is part of a larger evaluation project on Ghana's NHIS, sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Global Development Network as part of a two-year global research. We rely primarily on qualitative data from focus group discussion in the Brong Ahafo and the Upper East regions respectively. Our findings suggest that the NHIS has improved access to affordable health care services and prescription drugs to many people in Ghana. However, there are concerns about fraud and corruption that must be addressed if the Scheme is to be financially viable.

About the Author

Joseph Mensah is a Professor in the Department of Geography at York University. Mensah works in cultural studies, transnationalism, formations of ethno-racial identity, African development, socio-spatial dialectics, race and return migration.

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