The Oyo State government is to provide healthcare insurance for 10,000 primary school pupils in the state to further boost healthcare coverage for this category of residents.
This was disclosed by the Executive Secretary of the Oyo State Health Insurance Agency (OYHIA), Dr Sola Akande, during a one-day citizen town hall meeting on maternal health services organized by the Justice Development and Peace Commission (JDPC) of the Catholic Archdiocese of Ibadan.
Akande, while speaking further, said the beneficiaries, once enrolled, would have access to healthcare, thereby relieving their parents of spending huge sums of money on treatment when they fall sick.
He added that Governor Seyi Makinde has transformed the healthcare sector in the state with his health insurance vision, “which now means that residents should no longer bother about the cost of treatment for any ailment once they are enrolled in the programme.
“I want to say that recently, the agency paid about N8 million for the open-heart surgery for one of the enrollees at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH). Also, the cost of caesarean sections for about 200 women were paid for; this is the power of insurance and this is the vision of Governor Seyi Makinde.
“In fact, I do get messages on a daily basis from people who want to come and appreciate me for the treatment they got for certain ailments because they never thought they could ever access such treatments and in such hospitals, but as I used to say, this is the vision of Governor Makinde for healthcare delivery in the state.
“It is, therefore, important for residents of the state to use the primary healthcare centres in their localities and also register for health insurance to be able to benefit from all these,” Akande said.
Earlier, the Director of JDPC, Reverend Father Charles Ajibaye, said the town hall meeting was to assess the level of maternal healthcare in the state.
Reverend Father Ajibaye, lamented that the mortality rate in the country is still high, and charged state and federal governments to continue to work to bring down the rate to the barest minimum.
He said the JDPC would continue to draw attention to issues affecting the public so that urgent steps can be taken to address them.
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