The Wellbeing Foundation Africa (WBFA) commends her partner, Pharm Access Foundation, which works in a public-private partnership with the Kwara State Health Insurance Program; the private insurer, Hygeia Community Health Care; and the Health Insurance Fund (HIF), for the 2016 Financial Times/International Finance Corporation Transformational Business Award for Achievement in Sustainable Development: Maternal & Infant Health. The program was set up in 2007 with a strong support of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Since its inception, the program has delivered substantial results in terms of improved maternal and child healthcare in Kwara State, Nigeria. For example, hospital deliveries rose from 50% in 2009 to 70% in 2013. World Bank data shows that Kwara has become the second-best performing improved Nigerian state in maternal and child care.
The Financial Times newspaper (FT) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, and the largest global development institution that focuses exclusively on the private sector in developing countries presented the award to the Kwara State Health Insurance Program, recently. The award recognizes ground-breaking, long-term private sector solutions to key development issues.
The Wellbeing Foundation Africa continues to build on the initial ground-breaking support lent to the Kwara State Health Insurance Program in 2007, with further support through the innovative program, the Alaafia Universal Health Coverage Fund (AUHCF), launched in 2015, which has helped to improve health care by providing universal health coverage for 5,000 people including expectant and nursing mothers; adolescent girls; the elderly; persons living with HIV & AIDS; and children below age 5 years. The Wellbeing Foundation Africa looks forward to continually support this health insurance program, in line with our ideals for attaining Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
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