Accountability will be a top priority in health resource management, Cabinet Secretary (CS) for Health, Nakhumicha S. Wafula emphasized during a media briefing ahead of the national high-level dialogue scheduled for next week (26–28 June) in Nairobi that will deliberate on health financing and help build consensus towards health financing reform priorities and action.
According to the CS, the upcoming national dialogue will be a follow-up of the African Leadership Meeting (ALM)- Investing in Health declaration made at the sidelines of the 32nd ordinary assembly of Heads of States and Governments of the African Union held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
“We cannot have people raising funds to support the health sector while others are misusing it. We will come for such individuals who are misusing those funds,” said Ms. Nakhumicha.
She warned individuals who misuse and misappropriate funds meant for healthcare projects and procurement for their own selfish-interest that they will be dealt with according to the laws of the country.
She further said that the government, through the Ministry of Health, is looking for innovative ways to mobilise domestic resources to sustain health financing towards universal health coverage.
Kenya, like other low and middle-income countries faces two major obstacles: insufficient domestic funding and inefficient use of available resources. As the country is now perceived by foreign donors as capable of financing its health system, the country must transition from donor dependency to self-sufficiency.
The other challenge remains to manage this transition effectively without losing health gains achieved in the last decade.
The upcoming dialogue summit is aimed at raising the overall profile, awareness, and influence of a national high-level on domestic health financing with experts presenting position papers that will be turned into an implementation plan which will form action.
Kenya faces serious donor dependency in several key subsectors of its health system. External financing makes up more than half of all funding for immunizations, tuberculosis (TB), and HIV.
She said that as part of ALM implementation, the AU has given the mandate to regional economic communities to hold the national health financing dialogue and identifying key priorities areas and how they can be achieved.
While Council of Governors (CoG) Health Committee chairperson Muthomi Njuki revealed that the country still allocates sub optimal funds for health.
He added that Kenya invests less than 15percent in health, yet donor funding is decreasing. “This is happening despite most of the county governments spending more than 30 percent of their annual budget on health,” he said.
Njuki urged the government to increase investment in health from the current 11percent to 15 percent in line with the Abuja Declaration (2001).
Ag Director of Health Financing at the Ministry of Health, Dr. Wangia Elizabeth, said that Kenya will be the first country in East Africa and third in Africa to host the national high-level dialogue on health financing.
East Africa Community (EAC) Regional Facilitator Regina Ombam reminded the meeting of the ten ALM declarations which included call for increase domestic investment in health and for Heads of State to review country performance annually – against the benchmarks of the Africa Scorecard on Domestic Financing for Health.
The declaration urged member states to convene AU Ministers of Finance and Health every two years to discuss implementation of these health financing reforms and to review progress against benchmarks.
It also mandated member states to complement their Scorecard with a domestic health financing ‘Tracker’ that will guide health financing reforms and track country progress in implementing these ‘enablers’ of progress.
It urged members states to establish Regional Health Financing Hubs in each of Africa’s five regions (based in RECs) to facilitate peer-to-peer learning by providing practical and technical expertise to support countries to implement these reforms and to coordinate alignment of partner efforts to Africa’s priorities.
The declaration urged governments to better engage the private sector, create conducive investment climates and increase Member State stewardship of private sector support so that such efforts strengthen public health systems and expand access to health services.
It also called for Increased coherence of investment in health by aligning development partner and private sector efforts to the priorities of the continent.
The declaration also emphasized on improved public financial management (PFM) capacity to help improve tax collection and/or increase the proportion of tax revenue collected as a percentage of GDP, through equitable and efficient general taxation and improved revenue collection, and strengthen the capacities of Ministries of Finance and tax revenue authorities to achieve this.
Digitization of the Africa Scorecard on Domestic Financing for Health so that the data used to review performance is more widely disseminated.
Enhance national health financing systems, including exploring options to reduce fragmentation, explore national health insurance (where appropriate), strengthen procurement and purchasing and improve prevention, cost-effectiveness and efficiency.
Improve effectiveness by reorienting health spending and health systems to target the diseases that have the greatest impact on mortality and human capital development with the mix of interventions that will deliver the greatest impact in combatting them.
“As EAC, we are piloting this program in three countries to bring in states, donors, and finance development partners to finance health,” Ombam remarked.
