Lagos State Campaign on Ilera Eko

Oluwabunmi Fache

The Lagos State Health Management Agency (LASHMA) has launched campaign on Ilera Eko with the aim of promoting Ilera Eko Health plan and also scale up the grassroots enrolment of Lagos residents on the scheme.

The Special Adviser, Office of Civic Engagement, Princess Aderemi Adebowale, at the event, Wednesday 10th 2021 at Agege Local Government, said “health insurance is a way of paying for medical bills and health care costs. Most people can’t pay for all their health care out-of- pocket. Health insurance is therefore the way to go in making it easier to pay our health care bills, and help us get the care we need. This is the practice in many advanced and developed worlds today.

This sensitization we are starting today would go to all the 20 LGAs to encourage more people especially at the grassroots to embrace the insurance policy facilitated by this administration. The intention is to deliver this Lagos State Health Insurance Scheme to the citizens and for the people to own the programme with a view to making it resoundingly successful.

The second pillar in the developmental plan of the administration of Mr. Governor, Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu, as encapsulated in the T.H.E.M.E.S Agenda is on health and the environment. All around the globe, health remains on the priority list of every government at all levels and therefore our dear State cannot afford to be an exception. A healthy nation, it is said, is a wealthy nation’’.

Continuing she said, “this is the reason the administration of Governor Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu is focused on ensuring that all the residents of Lagos State, have access to quality, equitable and affordable healthcare regardless of their socio-cultural and economic status, towards the attainment of Universal Health Coverage (UHC) in our State. This has necessitated the Government to embark on the building and renewal of health facilities all around the State and the continuous initiation and promotion of various intervention programmes which include the Lagos State Health Insurance Scheme also known as ‘ILERA EKO’. There is no doubt that health insurance is new in Nigeria but the journey of health insurance in Lagos State started over six years ago with the signing of the Lagos State Health Law in 2015, while access to care commenced in 2020”.

Also speaking at the event, the General Manager, Lagos State Health Management Agency, (LASHMA), Doctor Emmanuella Zamba, stated that Governance is all about the people and this initiative is for the people. The Office of Civic Engagement as part of its mandates to interface between the Government and the citizens of Lagos State is therefore in collaboration with LASHMA, the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for the scheme in organising this sensitisation drive.

Mrs Adebowale admonished citizens to make the sensitization very interactive as the Lagos State Health Management Agency team led by it’s able General Manager will avail us with the details and the modes of operation for the scheme, and further stated that one of the tested principles in governance is that nothing has been achieved until it has been delivered and rightly placed in public domain.