Franck Nguema, former Minister of Youth and Sports, has urged a fundamental overhaul of Gabon’s Caisse nationale d’assurance maladie et de garantie sociale (CNAMGS) during a press briefing in Akanda. Addressing concerns raised by the 2025 World Health Organization (WHO) report, he emphasized that the issue is not the CNAMGS’s existence but its ability to deliver tangible healthcare benefits to policyholders.

Nguema clarified that the WHO’s assessment does not label the CNAMGS as a ‘fraud’ or ‘scam’, but underscores the urgent need for systemic reforms. While he acknowledged Gabon’s progress in expanding administrative medical coverage—now covering 76% of the population—he stressed that enrollment alone is meaningless without real access to care.

Many Gabonese still struggle to see doctors, obtain prescriptions, secure hospital beds, or receive timely treatment. This gap between official coverage and actual healthcare access fuels public frustration and erodes trust in social protection systems.

Beyond enrollment: a call for effective healthcare guarantees

To address these challenges, Nguema proposed shifting the CNAMGS’s focus from mere enrollment numbers to ‘a national guarantee of effective medical coverage’. He argued that the agency’s success should be measured not just by how many people are insured, but by practical outcomes: healthcare access rates, drug availability, wait times, and reduced out-of-pocket expenses for households.

This shift, he believes, would mark a paradigm change—one where the CNAMGS prioritizes health outcomes over paperwork. By doing so, it could become a powerful tool for poverty reduction and equitable healthcare delivery across Gabon.