Universal Health Coverage: Partners discuss national plan

Universal Health Coverage (UHC) is all about everybody having the right and is able to use quality health services without facing any financial difficulties or hardship.

Through this definition, an expert from the Global Development Partners Networks for Universal Health Coverage with the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Geneva, Claude Meyer says he and other partners from Germany (GTZ) and the French Development Cooperation are currently in Cameroon to trace how UHC can be implemented in the context of Cameroon.

During a meeting chaired by the Minister of Public Health, Andre Mama Fouda on September 3, 2015, Claude Meyer said it is an issue that needs to be strategised because the decisions that will be taken will be sensitive.

One of such issues is that in the country, there are many micro schemes taking care of segmented health benefits such as the free malaria health care for kids below five years, the free care given to pregnant women using the voucher. The WHO expert says all these are through a specific scheme with a separate management unit and this makes it extremely inefficient.

He said the team is working towards simplifying and merging a number of such schemes so that a common National Strategy for Universal Health Coverage can be operational next year in Cameroon.