Only one in every four Kenyans has health insurance with more women than men covered in the rural areas.
Latest Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) survey shows that 20 percent of females in rural areas have access to some form of health cover compared to 19 percent among males.
However, at a national level there are more men who have taken up insurance at 27 percent compared women whose uptake is at 26 percent.
The KNBS Demographic and Health Survey key indicators further shows that the proportion of Kenyans with any health insurance is higher in urban areas with 39 percent of women and 41 percent of men reporting to own a cover.
“Health insurance increases with increasing wealth from five percent among females and males in the lowest wealth quantile to 56 percent among females and 60 percent among males in the highest wealth quantile,” said KNBS director general Macdonald Obudho
State run National Health Insurance Fund remains the most common type of health insurance with 24 percent of both men and women holding the cover.
The low health insurance uptake comes at time when the Kenya Kwanza government has announced plans to increase insurance by up 85 percent by 2030.
The push for Universal Health Coverage (UHC) which would have been a key driver in increasing insurance uptake has faced numerous challenges.
From lack of a proper financing mechanism, poor implementation by the government to the inability of the NHIF to cover the entire population.
However, the numbers of those insured is expected to dip as economic hardships have pushed 45 percent of Kenyans out of the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) and directly into the out of pocket expenditure.
An estimated 8.8 million Kenyans members have defaulted on monthly contributions.
The latest NHIF data for the financial year ended June 2022 shows that dormant members hit 8.8 million from 5.03 million the year before, making the insurer miss its Sh90.57 billion targeted premium collections for the review period.
