Kenya is set to deepen its health education and research collaboration with the United Kingdom following the signing of key agreements between President William Ruto and top UK universities, aimed at strengthening Kenya’s healthcare system and advancing pharmaceutical production.

During his visit to the UK on Wednesday, President Ruto witnessed the signing of Memoranda of Understanding with King’s College London and the University of Nottingham.

The two institutions will join the Kenya-UK Health Alliance to establish Centres of Health Education and Research Excellence in the country.

An additional agreement was signed with the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, which will support local pharmaceutical manufacturing at the BioVax Institute through the BRITE initiative.

Speaking after the signing ceremony, Ruto highlighted progress in Kenya’s healthcare reforms, especially in expanding health insurance coverage.

“We had about seven million people on health insurance a year ago. We now have 24 million people,” he said, attributing the rise to the new Social Health Insurance Fund. “Every day on average, 50,000 Kenyans register themselves on our health platform.”

He said the government is restructuring healthcare financing to ensure equity and long-term stability, especially for vulnerable groups.

“As a government, we decided that on matters of health, we are not going to depend on donors. We are going to be able to make it sustainable. We are going to build it on locally mobilized resources,” he stated.

He explained that under the revamped model, the contribution rate for vulnerable groups had dropped from ten percent to 2.75 percent, while contributions for other Kenyans had risen from 0.1 percent to 2.75 percent of their income.

“By doing so, we have created sustainable funding,” Ruto said.

He also underscored plans to improve services in public hospitals and revealed collaboration with Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja to equip health facilities without putting pressure on the national budget.

Ruto noted the deployment of 107,000 Community Health Promoters countrywide under a national-county framework, including 7,840 in Nairobi alone.

“These promoters are people who have been trained on the very basics of what to look out for in communities, especially when attending to them on matters of health,” he said.