By John Oyuke

Kenya: The World Bank has approved $41 million (Sh3.56b) credit for Kenya to improve the delivery of essential health services to its people, especially the poor.

 The International Development Agency (IDA) credit for the Health Sector Support Project is accompanied by a $20 million (Sh1.74b) grant from the Health Results Innovation Trust Fund.

The Fund is supported by the United Kingdom and Norway and helps countries to sharpen their focus on health results.

The bank said the new funding will support delivery of quality health and nutrition services to as many as 35 million people by 2016. Of these beneficiaries, half are women and about 16 per cent live in drought-prone areas.

World Bank Country Director for Kenya, Diarietou Gaye, said recent reforms in the health sector must lead the country closer to universal health coverage, so that all Kenyans benefit from decent health services, regardless of where they live or how much they earn.

“Our support will help ensure that poor and vulnerable people – who most urgently need these services – are not left behind,” she added in a statement.

Kenya has been implementing extensive reforms in its health sector, including setting up a single Ministry of Health and empowering the 47 counties to manage health services.

The new funds will be used to help manage these changes, and ensure that poor people benefit from the reforms.

Lead Health Specialist at the World Bank, Ramana Gandham, noted that as Kenya’s counties adjust to the decentralised way of working, the project will build their capacity to identify and manage their key priorities.

According to the bank, the project will scale up an approach known as Results-Based Financing, which pays frontline health facilities based on the quality and quantity of services they provide.

This approach, the bank source added, has helped deliver rapid improvements in other African countries. In Kenya, there have been promising early results for women and children in Samburu County, where the Results-Based Financing approach was first tested.

essential services

For example, essential services such as ante-natal check-ups during pregnancy are reaching more women.

The approach will soon be extended to 20 more counties in Kenya’s arid and semi-arid areas, where access to quality health services is generally weak, and public-private partnership is key, disclosed World Bank.

According to the statement by the Bretton Woods institution, the project will support health insurance subsidies for poor people during the first phase of Kenya’s universal health coverage effort.

High out-of-pocket expenses currently prevent more than half the country’s poor households from accessing services they need, lowering their income and productivity.

“It will also support improved county capacity for delivering effective health services,” added the statement.