Senator Joseph Victor Ejercito on Wednesday raised concern on the P89.9 billion transfer and utilization of the reserve funds from Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) to the unprogrammed fund of the national government.
As the author and sponsor of the Universal Health Care Law (UHC) Law, Ejercito noted that health funds should be used for the health of Filipinos. He stressed that the government “must prioritize increasing the quality of benefits and lower the contribution of our people.”
Former PhilHealth Director Dr. Anthony Leachon noted that excess funds should not be directed to unprogrammed appropriations within the national budget when PhilHealth has been ineffective to carry out its mandate of ensuring affordable, acceptable, available and accessible healthcare services for Filipinos.
“This goes against the spirit of the UHC Law or Republic Act No. 11223, which, in Section 11, states that “…whenever actual reserves exceed the required ceiling at the end of the fiscal year, the excess of the PhilHealth reserve fund shall be used to increase the program’s benefits and to decrease the amount of members’ contributions,” said Leachon, also former president of the Philippine College of Physicians.
“No portion of the reserve fund or income thereof shall accrue to the general fund of the national government or to any of its agencies or instrumentalities, including government-owned or controlled corporations,” he added.
The health advocate expressed alarm that despite having excess funds, PhilHealth has yet to comply with the Section 11 provisions of the UHC Law.
Further, he said the excess PhilHealth funds are revenues from taxes on tobacco, vapes, alcohol, and sugar-sweetened beverages. He said these are specifically earmarked for health programs.
Although premiums of direct contributors increased this year since the COVID-19 pandemic, he pointed out that PhilHealth benefit packages have not sufficiently been expanded to reduce out-of-pocket expenditures, especially for the poorest of the poor.
Due to this, he said our legislators and policymakers must investigate this terrible lack of foresight and care for Filipino patients.
He emphasized that PhilHealth must be held accountable for its gross negligence and inefficiency.
The Department of Finance, too, should revise its Circular 003-2024, which allows the transfer of unutilized funds of PhilHealth. He said the Office of the Government Corporate Counsel should not also attempt to do legal acrobatics to justify a bad decision on this issue.
