The Kenya Government’s drive towards the provision of universal health care has met with several challenges such as shortage of government budgetary resources, resource misuse, service delivery infrastructure gaps in public healthcare facilities and labour unrest among health workers. Further, approximately 80% of Kenyans have no health Insurance and rely on out-of-pocket payments to finance their healthcare needs.
These challenges have resulted in an increasing reliance on small private hospitals and clinics for the provision of care to the majority of the Kenyan population.
However, the cost of medication in these facilities are high in comparison to costs in the larger private hospitals because large hospitals procure in bulk (and receive large discounts), whilst small hospitals do not. Studies have shown that in the private sector, the retail cost of healthcare products is over 30 times more expensive when compared to regional and international indices.