Women registered under NHIS
The Emefa Help Ghana Foundation (EHGF) is helping women in rural areas to register freely for the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), as part of its project to reduce maternal mortality.
According to the founder of the foundation, Ms Emefa Akosua Adite, winner of Ghana’s Most Beautiful (2012), a number of women in the rural areas have not registered with the NHIS and that accounted for the increased maternal mortality in those areas.
The EHGF is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation that was founded in 2012 to help improve maternal healthcare, especially in the rural areas.
Aims of the foundation
The foundation also aims at training young ladies in vocations like fashion designing, dressmaking and hairdressing to enable them to earn some income.
Ms Adite told the Daily Graphic at the launch of the pilot registration exercise at Bakpa in the Central Tongu District in the Volta Region last Saturday that most people in the area had not registered because they claimed they did not have the money to do so.
“Most of the women here told us they did not have money to register themselves and their families under the NHIS,” she said.
She reiterated that most of the women in the community were also not aware of the operation of the NHIS, due to inadequate and inconsistent education on the scheme.
She said the pilot edition was sponsored by Joy Industries Limited and Ramani Distributions Limited, adding that they would go to different villages and register the community members as and when they were able to raise enough funds.
Focus on women
Explaining why the exercise was being carried out for only women, she said the foundation was established with the alleviation of the plight of women as its priority but with time they would start addressing some of the challenges that confronted men.
“The focus is on women but as time goes on, if there are opportunities to support men, we will do our best to address their needs,” Ms Adite indicated.
She called on corporate Ghana to help the foundation to reach out to women in other communities and districts across the country.
A resident of the Bakpa community expressed her gratitude to EHGF for coming to their aid, since it would have been difficult for them to register with the scheme.
