SUBIN INSURANCE SCHEME REGISTERS PRISONERS (PAGE 25)

THE Management and staff of the Subin Mutual Health Insurance Scheme in Kumasi last Wednesday registered all inmates serving various sentences at the Kumasi Central Prisons to enable them to enjoy quality health care.
As many as 1,908 inmates, including 55 females at the Kumasi Central Prisons, have benefited from the scheme.
This is the second time, in less than three months, that the management and staff of the Subin Mutual Health Insurance Scheme have brought health insurance to the doorsteps of the ordinary Ghanaian.
In their first exercise, they went to the Kejetia Terminal, in the heart of Kumasi, and registered porters, most of whom were females carrying babies.
As many as 10,000 members were registered during the exercise, and that was to enhance quality health delivery among the porters.
According to the Ashanti Regional Prisons Commander, Mr Ambrose Imoro Salifu, the exercise at the Central Prisons, which was a collaboration between the Government of Ghana and the management of the Subin Mutual Insurance Scheme, would also benefit all officers at the Central Prisons, their spouses as well as their dependants.
Commenting on the exercise, Mr Salifu, who described the registration of the inmates as very laudable, said it came at a time his administration was finding it very difficult to settle its debts, which the institution owed Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH).
“We owe KATH authorities as much as GH¢400,000.00, and this has forced them to threaten denying the inmates any more services, but in spite of the threats, we continued to send them there for medical services, because we had no other alternative,” Mr Salifu said.
He said the situation got to a stage where they had to use their internally generated funds to buy drugs for the inmates, "because after attending to the inmates at the hospital, prescriptions were written for us to buy drugs, and this has affected our operations".
"The authorities at the KATH had been doing their best, because some doctors sometimes come here to provide medical services to some of our inmates, and so it is unfortunate that we sometimes fail to honour our debts.
“With this new development, there would be a healthy relationship between us, and the inmates also would be offered the best of services when the need arises to keep them healthy as we also do our best to reform them," Mr Salifu said.
Mr Salifu commended the government for the gesture and gave the assurance that the institution would provide the necessary support to facilitate the registration of all the inmates.
The Public Relations Officer of the Subin Mutual Health Insurance Scheme, Mr Joseph Sarkodie, also told the Daily Graphic that the initiative by the government was to enhance health delivery for the ordinary Ghanaian.
" Just as we did for the porters and registered many of them free of charge, we are doing the same for the inmates to enable them to access quality health care when the need arise,” he assured.
He said the initiative was subject to renewal, especially in respect of those who were serving long sentences.
Mr Sarkodie appealed to corporate bodies, institutions and firms to take a cue from the government’s initiative and also register their workers to enable them to benefit from quality health care delivery.
This, he said, would increase productivity at all levels, explaining that such a gesture would boost the morale of the workers.