Previous page | New search |
The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here
Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Financing Medical Care through Insurance: Policy Lessons from Household- and Community-Level Analysis in Kenya |
Authors: | Mwabu, Germano Wang'ombe, Joseph Nganda, Benjamin Gakura, Octavian |
Year: | 2002 |
Periodical: | African Development Review |
Volume: | 14 |
Issue: | 1 |
Period: | June |
Pages: | 75-97 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Kenya |
Subjects: | health insurance health financing Economics and Trade Development and Technology Health and Nutrition |
External link: | https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8268.00046/pdf |
Abstract: | Medical insurance is an important feature of a health care system in which patients pay user charges to get medical treatment. Without insurance, many people could not afford acceptable care in a fee-for-service system. Since health is a merit good, making insurance broadly available in communities is a major policy issue in countries where user fees finance medical treatments. This paper analyses data from facility and household surveys in Kenya in March-April 1998. The survey covered 58 health facilities and 2017 households in four dictricts, one each in Nyanza, Central, Eastern and Coast Provinces. It shows that policies which popularize medical insurance can be inefficient because there exist community and household level factors that inhibit its use. The results further reveal substantial variations in the way the variables that influence the use of insurance affect different population sub-groups. The paper concludes that factors such as place of residence, gender, income, education, community institutions, transaction costs and facility quality that hinder or facilitate use of medical insurance have to be considered when institutionalizing insurance in communities. Bibliogr., note, sum. in English and French. |