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Health insurance will check maternity, infant mortality – Okowa

Delta State Governor, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, has said health insurance for children, women and the vulnerable was a sure way of checking maternal and infant mortality in the country.

 

Okowa stated this yesterday when he received the visiting team of the National Executive Committee of International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) on at the Government House, Asaba.

 

He said that many pregnant women had died due to poor medical attention, stressing that paying premiums through health insurance would reverse the ugly trend, and recommended the scheme for other states in the country that had not embraced it (the health insurance scheme).

 

He said that pregnant women and children of zero to five years had benefitted from the contributory health insurance scheme of his administration and advocated that issues bordering on women and children should be accorded special attention.

 

“In our contributory health insurance programme, which l believe is important for us as a nation and as a state, we have since 2017 that we fully operationalised the scheme been paying the premium for all pregnant women and children under five years of age.

 

“Yes, it has some cost and we are able to bear the burden and it is something that l have continuously tried to speak to concerning Nigeria  that it is doable by our Nigerian nation,” Okowa said.

 

He lauded FIDA for being a voice for women, children and the vulnerable in the society, especially in the fight against gender-based violence, gender-inequality, child-abuse and other obnoxious acts against women and children.

 

Apart from the various programmes and projects in the Ministry of Women Affairs, Job Creation Office and Micro Credit Scheme, aimed at alleviating poverty, the governor said his administration had also created the Girl Child Entrepreneurship Office to cater for girls between the ages of 18 and 30 years.

 

“We are doing the best we can within the limit of the challenges that we have in our nation because we know that we are in troubled times, but l believe that God will continuously intervene and grant us more peaceful place.

 

“I must congratulate you on the work that you do especially when your work is directed towards uplifting and ensuring justice for those who are more vulnerable in the society especially the women and children

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