N.H.I. gets raving reviews from U.B. and SPEAR

The report card on the National Health Insurance scheme is out and apparently, the plan has passed with flying colours. The results are part of independent surveys conducted by SPEAR and the University of Belize at various stages of the pilot project. The performance of the scheme was judged in five main areas: equity and access, financial sustainability, effectiveness and quality, efficiency and productivity, and responsiveness and social participation. According to Doctor Ramon Figueroa, the person who compiled the report, the budget allotted for the project was only off by a dollar per person, with a total of two hundred and eighteen dollars spent on each individual signed onto the plan. After the project was extended for an additional three months, the total budget was four million, twenty-two thousand dollars. Approximately twenty-one thousand, five hundred residents from the south side of the Belize District were treated through the plan, with patients reporting less time spent in waiting rooms and easy access to clinics and specialists. The report goes on to state that sixty-one percent of those surveyed felt they were spending quality time with their doctors and therefore were receiving quality care. Overall, under the N.H.I., satisfaction was rated at eighty-nine out of a hundred for private hospitals and sixty-nine out of a hundred for public hospitals. The final conclusion of the report is that with proper funding and the collaboration of key stakeholders like the Ministry of Health, the Social Security Board and the Belize Medical Association, N.H.I. will be able to provide Belizeans with the highest value for money possible in the health sector. No decision has yet been made as to when or how N.H.I. will be implemented on a nation-wide basis. News 5 was unable to obtain official comment from the Ministry of Health about the assessment report.