President William Ruto announced that the national government will review and simplify visa and work permit requirements for missionaries to facilitate their work.
The President made this statement on Thursday while inaugurating a state-of-the-art cardiothoracic center at Tenwek Mission Hospital in Bomet County.
He praised religious organizations for their longstanding collaboration with the government in delivering affordable and accessible healthcare to Kenyans.
“We invite more public-private partnerships to boost investments in the development of healthcare infrastructure and the expansion of services,” he said.
The facility, one of its kind in East Africa, was put up with funding from the African Gospel Church, World Gospel Mission (WGM) and Samaritan’s Purse.
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Notable leaders present at the function were Samaritan Purse’s chief operations officer Edward Graham, WGM president Dan Schafer and Tenwek Mission Hospital board of directors chairman Rev. Robert Lang’at.
Others were Health Cabinet Secretary Deborah Barasa, her Roads and Transport counterpart Davis Chirchir, Governors Hillary Barchok (Bomet) and Joseph ole Lenku (Kajiado) as well as other leaders.
At the same time, the President urged Kenyans to continue registering with the Social Health Authority, saying they would enjoy more healthcare benefits than they did under the defunct National Health Insurance Fund.
“Primary healthcare is now free at all dispensaries and health centres, as well as selected hospitals, while ambulance and emergency services are available nationwide free of charge,” he said.
Further, he said more than 13 million Kenyans have registered under SHA in the past month, and expressed confidence that migration from NHIF would be completed in the next three months.
