Health group cries robbery with planned PhilHealth premium increase

"PhilHealth has already been a scam, and any big increase in contributions would be outright robbery," said Dr. Joseph M. Carabeo, secretary-general of Health Alliance for Democracy (HEAD). "This planned contribution increase from P200 to P275 despite its ballooning budget of P57 billion in 2018 should cause an outcry."

"From 2011 to 2017, Philhealth's share in the country's total health expenditure remained low at 11%, while our out-of-pocket expenditure remained high at 50%," Carabeo quipped. This is despite PhilHealth's increase in paid premiums (P1200 to P2400 annually in 2011) and government funding (PhilHealth budget of P3.5 billion in 2011 to P53 billion in 2017).

"A strengthened and more institutionalized PhilHealth, to be renamed as the Philippine Health Security Corporation, is the primary goal of the Universal Health Coverage Bill. The bill is deceptive and should be junked," Carabeo added.

"PhilHealth is run as a corporation, and from healthcare as a right, health is now translated into calculated and ever-limited benefits," added Carabeo. Their preoccupation will be more of the corporation's "survival" with a steady reserve fund for investment, especially funding its top heavy corporate managers and its entire new layer of bureaucracy for the lure of private efficiency.

In the actual setting, government-owned hospitals perennially suffer annual budget cuts and almost always lack basic supplies and medicine. This forces PhilHealth card bearing members to buy at drug stores outside the hospital. The No Balance Billing scheme does not cover pre- and post-hospitalized procedures either. Meanwhile, paying PhilHealth members practically get only discounts (e.g. case rates) and pay the rest of the balance either by themselves or via an additional private health insurance.

The people aspire for a free, comprehensive public healthcare with government taking the primary responsibility. Instead, the government has continually reneged on this and turned to health insurance premiums through so-called risk sharing/solidarity mechanisms.

"Practically, this means instituting more fees for services and a plea for more private participation—privatization! This is robbery in the simplest terms," Carabeo lamented. "We therefore call on the people to resist any increase in the PHilHealth premiums, to demand that instead of hefty government subsidies to PhilHealth, these be diverted to increased budget to government hospital operations and direct public health services," Carabeo ended.##