The National Health Insurance Authority says its officers are available to assist subscribers in the Ashanti region who have challenges with registering or linking their NHIS card to the Ghana card.

Ashanti Regional Director of NHIA, Kwadwo Tweneboah-Koduah said he has observed that many clients are finding it hard to complete the process.

“Our offices and staff are still on the stand-by. We appreciate the fact that not everybody is IT compliant.

“All our offices are open. We’ve trained all of our staff to help anybody who finds it difficult to renew their membership or link their Ghana cards to the NHIS.

“Existing members who are unable to link their cards are advised to bring their Ghana card when they visit our offices, so their health insurance cards could be linked to the Ghana card,” he said.

The Ashanti regional NHIA in its bid to have more Ghanaians subscribe to the scheme took to the streets to educate the public on the new renewal policy.

The event is in commemoration of the NHIA Week, under the theme: “Using the Ghana Card for Expanding Access to Healthcare”.

Mr. Tweneboah-Koduah, indicated the exercise is in line with the government’s aim of providing universal healthcare coverage.

“Our responsibility as an office is to get everyone on board to have unimpeded access to healthcare.

“This is a long-term goal of the government to have universal healthcare coverage in the country,” he said.

Mr. Tweneboah-Koduah pointed out that new registrants can conveniently link their NHIS cards to the Ghana card through a digital platform using the mobile renewal service code (*929#).

“We are also making provisions for those registering afresh. If you happen to be a new registrant and have a Ghana card, we expect you to bring along the card when coming to our offices.

“With this, we can easily link your details to the Ghana card so we don’t have to issue an NHIS card for you.

“The Ghana card now becomes your health card for accessing free healthcare delivery.

“So, we are encouraging every citizen to take this opportunity to link their cards,” he said.

The Ashanti region currently has an estimated 2,429,586 active members as of June, 2021.

The figure represents seventy-three percent of the regional directorate’s target of 3 million subscriptions.