CarePay receives KES 150 million grant from AFD to improve M-TIBA

CarePay has received a KES 150 million grant from Agence Française de Développement (AFD) to further build the functionality and reach of the M-TIBA platform.

M-TIBA is now available in over 2000 healthcare providers across Kenya, with about 3.5 million registered users on public and private healthcare schemes. In 2018 M-TIBA founding partner PharmAccess Foundation, acting in its capacity as NHIF agent, deployed M-TIBA for registrations in three of the four counties selected for the Universal Health Coverage pilot.The AFD funds will be used to develop new technology modules on the M-TIBA platform. These include biometric registration, enhanced integration with insurance IT systems and new patient data and privacy units.

Kees van Lede, Chief Executive Officer, CarePay Ltd said, “This partnership will help CarePay improve the M-TIBA platform’s capability and reach. It is building better and more secure health financing solutions for individuals and organizations. CarePay is focused on making healthcare more accessible to all. The push for universal healthcare coverage in Africa is not going to happen without harnessing cutting edge mobile technology for cost effective registrations and transparent administration of large-scale financing schemes.”

AFD is also financing the roll out of the M-TIBA platform to 500 new healthcare providers nationwide and a national awareness campaign to encourage responsible health financing behavior by Kenyans, such as promoting the importance of health savings and health insurance.

Healthcare schemes administered on M-TIBA benefit from customers being able to make regular micro payments towards savings and insurance schemes. Finally, the financing will allow use of the platform by local population in rural and remote areas, and will enable to align it with international standards on data protection (GDPR) for further expansion.

M-TIBA helps Governments and donors to reward good health savings behavior and provide targeted funding support to social health insurance schemes. KES 400 million has already been paid out on savings, insurance and employee schemes through M-TIBA.

AFD’s country Director, Mr Ghislain de Valon, said, “Beyond the financing itself, AFD and CarePay wish to build a partnership whose objective would be to capitalize on the key challenges for the Universal Health Coverage and possible digital solutions, with the idea of working to disseminate the lessons learned from this experiment: the first CarePay extension pilots in Nigeria and Tanzania show in particular the structure’s ability to adapt to situations where mobile currency has not yet developed.”

Speaking on the partnership, the Ambassador of France to Kenya, Mrs Aline Kuster-Ménager said, “We are now looking forward to deliver impact for Kenyan communities and population to enable their access to quality health services.”