The migration from the National Health Insurance Fund to the Social Health Insurance Fund was supposed to be smooth and clean. This new health fund was meant to be a game changer, especially for patients at the bottom of the economic pyramid, once it was rolled out from October 1. Among others, the fund was supposed to address systemic inequalities in Kenya’s healthcare system. Senior government officials, including the President himself, have not missed a chance to promote the new health fund. But have their statements lived up to expectations? What is the reality on the ground? Are patients feeling the impact of SHIF?
The media decided to find out by visiting public and private hospitals and talking to patients, hospital administrators and relatives of stranded patients. The results have been devastatingly shocking. It is now emerging the government had been economical with the truth and that the transition to SHIF is a fine mess marked by technical problems, miscommunication, needless suffering for the terminally ill and a wave of confusion.
Broadcast and print media as well as news websites have not only exposed the contradictions of government messaging but also illustrated the salient role of the Press in entrenching accountability. Stubborn scepticism is what drives great journalism. Anytime a journalist goes the extra mile to find the truth for himself or herself without relying on statements from officialdom and busybodies, society gains.
The Daily Nation of October 3, 2024, ran a story of the chaotic transition under the banner headline “SHIF nightmare,” which, in the kicker, the editors aptly described as having triggered a “medical crisis of unspeakable horror.” The story, with on-the-ground reporting from Kisumu, Murang’a and other locations, laid bare the agonising pain of Kenyans facing delayed surgeries and “new mothers … unable to leave maternity wards” because “their NHIF cards have been disabled and they are unable to afford their bills for them to be discharged.”
The article included insightful interviews from a medic at the Murang’a Level 4 Hospital, the secretary general of the Kenya Medical Practitioners and Dentists Union Central branch and a health economist, who analysed the economic implications of the disorderly rollout. The reporters painted a sorry state that warrants urgent action from the Health ministry.
The Star focused on the suffering of kidney patients on the brink of missing their dialysis sessions because NHIF cannot cover the Sh9,500 they pay weekly. While the reporter of, “SHA off to a rocky start as patients miss dialysis” (October 2, 2024), misrepresented the amount to be paid as “2.75 per cent of [the] annual income”, instead of the monthly income, he interviewed two patients, and the Social Health Authority CEO, exposing a public healthcare system failing vulnerable Kenyans.
Both Citizen Digital and The Standard also amplified the uncertainties facing kidney patients, with Citizen giving voice to the Kenya Renal Association. The organisation complained about “NHIF’s failure to adjust reimbursement rates to match market conditions,” while sounding a warning that the “financial shortfall has forced several dialysis units to shut down, undoing much of the progress made.”
The bold reporting by these four news outlets shows what committed journalism can achieve when it is unafraid to ask difficult questions. In a polarised age when the Kenyan media is deemed timid and compromised, often echoing and rehashing the talking points of bureaucrats, the stories remain a ray of hope. Is it possible for newsrooms to sustain this type of reporting? Maybe. However, this will only depend on what they hope to achieve in the long-term, which is not just winning more audiences, but playing their watchdog role of checking state failure.
