PhilHealth eyes own building in Iloilo
In celebration of his 1st anniversary as President and CEO of Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth), Dr. Rey B. Aquino cites his three wishes for the Corporation during his visit at PhilHealth Regional Office VI last August 11-12, 2009.
“As I speak before you, I hope that 5 years from now, I will be standing on a building already owned by PhilHealth. I want also to see PhilHealth grow to be the largest and strongest social health insurance not only in Asia but all throughout the world and ultimately for the employees of PhilHealth to imbibe within themselves the true essence of public service as we all deliver quality health care service to our members,” said Dr. Aquino.
Together with other officers of PhilHealth, Tito M. Mendiola - Senior Vice President for Operations, Gregorio C. Rulloda - Area Vice President for South Luzon & Visayas Area, Vice President for Corporate Affairs, Ruben John Basa and Regional Vice President (PhRO 6) Alberto C. Manduriao also talked with Local Chief Executives in each Service Office (Sara, Capiz, Passi City & Antique).
Resounding commitments are extended by local chief executives, to include Mayor Raul Tupas (Barotac Viejo), Mayor Ermelita C. Salcedo (Sara), Governor Victor A. Tanco Sr. (Capiz), Mayor Dante B. Bermejo (Panay), Mayor Elyzer Chavez (Passi City), Mayor Rey P. Grabato (Mina) and Governor Salvacion Z. Perez (Antique), to continually support the National Health Insurance Program (NHIP) of the government.
As mandated, PhilHealth has to universally cover 85% of the 90 million total population, 15 years after its inception. Persistently, PhilHealth has overshot this goal several months before its target month. As early as February of this year, 69 million Filipinos are already covered by the program while 86% of the population currently with state health insurance.
Specifically, target for the Sponsored Program has been set to October of this year, where PhRO 6 has already universally covered five (5) out of six (6) provinces in Western Visayas, to which Negros Occidental is also nearing its universal coverage mandate.
Based on the National Statistics Coordinating Board data on poor population (CY 2006), PhilHealth now covers under its Sponsored Indigent Program, 153.91% or 65,058 indigent families in the province of Aklan, 119.21% (54,844) in Antique, 175.51% (61,405) in Capiz, while 24,883 (224.23%) household families were enrolled under the province of Guimaras and 128,415 (127.45%) in Iloilo. Only Negros Occidental has not yet attained universal coverage at 58.65%, PhRO 6 data shows as of July 2009.
“Apart from our mandate for universal coverage, it is also of equal importance to achieve universal collection and universal access to quality health care,” emphasized Dr. Aquino. Right now, PhilHealth benefits has continuously evolved to be attuned to the pressing medical needs of our members and we shall not stop until we give the best quality health care service to our clients. Further, we have launched our new package in response to the pandemic swine flu (A-H1N1) and subsidized the first four births (Normal Spontaneous Delivery) starting January 2009 confinement at a case rate of P4,500.00 but comes September of this year, Maternity Care Package will be at P6,500.00. Indeed, there’s a lot more to do, a lot more to accomplish. Yet, we have started something this past year and we will continue to better each year,” he added.