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Will the new social health insurance policy deliver universal health coverage for Kenya?
August 18th, 2025
Kenya’s new Social Health Insurance (SHI) policy which was launched in November 2023 came into effect in October 2024. The policy aspires to provide universal health coverage to all citizens.
To lay a foundation for monitoring the impact of the policy, the Financial Sector Deepening Kenya (FSD Kenya) and the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) carried out a baseline Health Finance Tracker survey mid-2024. The sample for the tracker survey was drawn from respondents of the FinAccess 2021 survey who had consented to follow-up interviews and provided a telephone number. It was explicitly stratified by livelihood categories and usage of insurance, specifically NHIF and private insurance. The findings were complemented by the 2024 FinAccess Household Survey undertaken later in the year.
Based on this baseline study: the proposed social health premium rates are not affordable for most Kenyans and would need to be reduced or subsidised; the expectations in terms of value for money will be high; the policy needs to decrease out of pocket expenditure by households and increase access to quality healthcare; determination and collection of premiums for the informal sector is likely to be a big challenge due to lack of visibility of incomes and a way of tapping of premiums at income source; and social health insurance initiatives need to be sustained beyond administrative cycles to realise universal health coverage.
To read the full report, click here – Kenya’s universal health coverage – Enhancing value through national social health insurance
