Patients Forced to Pay as Health Insurance Faces Two-Month Disruption
The Minority in Parliament has sounded the alarm over what it calls a creeping return to the dreaded cash-and-carry system in Ghana’s healthcare delivery, blaming it on the recent paralysis of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS).
According to the caucus, the NHIS has been largely non-functional for nearly two months, forcing patients to pay out of pocket for services that should be covered under the scheme.
Raising the issue on the floor of Parliament, the Second Deputy Minority Whip, Jerry Ahmed Shaib, described the situation as a serious setback to affordable healthcare and a crushing blow to ordinary citizens already battling economic hardship.
“As we speak today, the NHIS for close to two months has not been working. People have to pay before they are provided services. The links have been deactivated. We have now reverted to the cash-and-carry system,” he lamented.
Health facilities across the country have reported difficulty in processing NHIS claims and verifying patient information due to the outage, leading to long queues and complaints from patients turned away or asked to pay cash.
Meanwhile, the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) has acknowledged a temporary technical disruption affecting some of its electronic hospital management systems nationwide.
In a statement issued on Sunday, October 26, the NHIA assured the public that it is collaborating with the Ministry of Health and other partners to restore full functionality as quickly as possible.
The Authority also instructed all NHIS-accredited healthcare providers to continue offering services without interruption and to use the mobile phone–based Claims Check Code (CCC) system as a temporary measure to verify patients and process claims.
However, critics argue that the recurring technical breakdowns and funding delays are eroding public trust in the NHIS, once hailed as a cornerstone of Ghana’s universal healthcare ambition.
