National Health Insurance Fund

The National Health Insurance Fund is the body responsible for managing the national health insurance system in Sudan, a health social protection system based on pooling subscribers' contributions and supporting entities to purchase medical services for the insured instead of paying their full cost at the time of illness.

The experience of social health insurance in Sudan began in 1995, when the General Authority for Health Insurance was established with the aim of easing the burden of fees that were paid at public facilities and improving access to basic care, and coverage began mainly with workers in the organised sector. In 2003 the Authority was restructured and transformed into the National Health Insurance Fund, then the National Health Insurance Act of 2016 came to re-establish the Fund as the body managing the system, and stipulates mandatory registration for all residents, citizens and non-citizens, according to the International Labour Organization.

The Fund works to expand the population coverage umbrella, register families, issue insurance cards, and contract with hospitals, health centres and pharmacies to provide services to subscribers, purchasing services from their providers rather than providing them directly in most cases. Its categories include workers in the organised sector on a mandatory basis, and categories from the informal sector on a voluntary basis in the early stages, in addition to poor families covered with support from social entities such as the Zakat Chamber and the Ministry of Finance, according to social protection studies.

According to data conveyed by the International Labour Organization about the Fund, the population coverage rate rose to 55.8 percent in 2017, then 76.3 percent in 2019, and 89.1 percent by the end of 2021, figures that reflect registration in the umbrella and do not necessarily mean the level of actual service. The system's goal remains, within the national health policy, to achieve universal health coverage by 2030.

(Sources: International Labour Organization: Assessment of the National Health Insurance Fund and social protection studies in Sudan; Published academic research on the Fund's origins and expansion)

— Editorial Team