The United Nations Children’s Fund has pledged $150 million to support Kenya’s Universal Health Care program through immunization and nutrition programs in the next four years.
In a meeting between Sicily Kariuki, Kenya Health Cabinet Secretary and Werner Shultink, UNICEF’s representative, on how to improve the health care system in Kenya, Werner made the donation on behalf of UNICEF. This step is seen as a major boost to the health sector, which is part of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Big Four plan.
The government is focusing on providing access to quality health services for citizens of all classes by the year 2022 through having all citizens under health cover. Early this year, the World Health Organization pledged to support Kenya in making Universal Health Care coverage a reality.
Tedros Adhanom, WHO Director-General pledged to provide both technical and financial support towards the design of Kenya’s UHC benefit package and in the implementation of an effective community health strategy.
Thailand which has also successfully implemented Universal Health Care also declared a willingness to assist with both technical and training expertise to enable Kenya achieve UHC, during a visit to Thailand by Kariuki in May this year.
Universal Health Care in the country is beginning to take shape after CS Kariuki announced that a pilot for 100 per cent access to universal health care will be carried out in four counties.
The pilot projects will deal with finding out on the capacity of NHIF as well as improve infrastructure before rolling out to all counties. A health insurance plan for three million secondary students is also underway as directed by President Kenyatta last year. In the financial year 2018/2019 Universal Health Care has been allocated Sh44.6 billion.
