Uganda joins the world in celebrating Universal Health Coverage Day

Dec 16, 2014

On Friday, December 12 was the Universal Health Coverage Day. Uganda joined the world in celebrating the first ever Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Day that was celebrated everywhere in the world.

trueBy Charlotte Muheki Zikusooka

On Friday, December 12 was the Universal Health Coverage Day. Uganda joined the world in celebrating the first ever Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Day that was celebrated everywhere in the world.

On December 12, 2012, the United Nations General Assembly adopted by consensus Resolution 67/123 on UHC. It is this Resolution that has emboldened UHC to become a unifying central health goal in the post-2015 agenda that replaces the Millennium Development Goals after 2015.

This day will be celebrated on December 12, every year, as part of global commitment to moving towards the achievement of UHC. UHC refers to the goal of ensuring that all people in a given country have access to quality health services that meet their needs without being exposed to financial hardship in paying for these services.

This year global partners are getting together in a show of solidarity to celebrate progress toward health for all, to create awareness and to hold leaders accountable for achievement of UHC.

UHC has gained prominence on the global agenda because it emphasises health not only as a human right but also a cornerstone of sustainable development and global security. The achievement of UHC would ensure populations with good health, which would in turn transform communities, economies and nations.

This implies that achieving UHC would provide a positive return on investment. The fact that UHC is attainable as has been shown by countries like Rwanda, Thailand and Ghana has increased its appeal. UHC addresses the moral questions of poverty and inequality which have for long been at the centre of the global debate.

In Uganda, research has shown that annually about 4% of the population is pushed below the poverty line due to households’ direct spending on health care.

This represents about 1.32 million Ugandans. Furthermore, the study found that over 20% of the households in Uganda had to compromise their consumption of other basic needs (including food) as a result of spending on health care, and this is categorised as catastrophic health spending.

This represents an unacceptably high level of financial risk contrary to the financial protection principle emphasised within UHC. Furthermore, the utilisation of of health care services in Uganda was found to be inequitable, with the poorer households utilising less health care compared to their need for care.

In moving towards UHC, Uganda needs to undertake critical reforms to address the way health care is financed and delivered, in order to make it both more effective and fair.

Research conducted in Uganda has shown that reducing the reliance on direct households’ payments for health care and relying more on prepaid financing through public funding and health insurance will lead more fairness in the financing.

Therefore, we recommend two key actions to improve health financing in Uganda, as part of the UHC agenda. Firstly, innovative ways for increasing the tax funds allocated to the health sector need to be put in place that ensures a comprehensive package of health services of good quality.

These services should be accessible to all who need them. Secondly, increased Government spending should be supplemented by the implementation of the much-debated National Health Insurance scheme. Over and above health financing, achievement of UHC requires improvement of health service delivery, with emphasis on making services more accessible to the poor.

In the spirit of the UHC which we commemorate today, Uganda needs to continue on the path towards UHC since it is part of the goals and aspirations of the country as shown in the National Development Plan and Uganda’s Vision 2040.

All stakeholders in Uganda are called upon to take meaningful action that promotes the achievement of UHC as it requires a multi-stakeholder approach.

This works with HealthNet Consult (Uganda) which is a member of the Global Network for Health Equity.

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