The PhilHealth Local Health Insurance Office (LHIO) Caloocanhttps://www.philhealth.gov.ph/

MANILA, Philippines — “It’s a failure [kapalpakan],” Senate President Francis Escudero said on Thursday to explain the bicameral conference committee’s decision to scrap the P74-billion subsidy for the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) for 2025.

In a phone patch interview with reporters, Escudero said the incident should be a wake-up call for PhilHealth to do better.

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Due to its whopping P600 billion reserve funds, PhilHealth will get zero subsidy for 2025.

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Senate finance panel chair Sen. Grace Poe did not disclose how much PhilHealth would be getting for next year, but she assured the public that the corporation would still be granted an operational fund meant for the salary of its employees.

“Because it’d failure, I hope this serves as a wake-up call to them — if not a slap in the face — to do their job. It is not for us to reward their failure by giving them more money to stock,” Escudero said in Filipino.

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He said it was PhilHealth’s lapses that forced the creation of the Department of Health’s Medical Assistance to Indigent Patients to provide for the needs of Filipinos who couldn’t pay their bills.

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“Isn’t that almost an admission from DOH that PhilHealth itself is a failure? Remember, PhilHealth’s chairman is the DOH secretary. So that’s my answer to what they have been saying,” Escudero said.

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Escudero was then pressed to disclose whether PhilHealth alone should be blamed for the budget cut because its “absorptive capacity” was weak and it “did not do its job.”

“The absorptive capacity is not weak. What you call having a reserve of P600 billion [is] not performing its job of providing health benefits to our countrymen,” he said.

The speech, which comes a little over a month before the ruling Labour Party’s first detailed budget, will be closely watched by investors amid fears of tax hikes.

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“That is stated in the Universal Healthcare Law. That is the mandate of PhilHealth — zero [or] no balance billing. Well, instead of PhilHealth being able to do that, and because it is sloppy, I repeat, that is why MAIP was invented to fill the shortfall of PhilHealth,” he added.

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When asked about his other colleagues’ claims that scrapping PhilHealth’s subsidy was unconstitutional, Escudero argued that Philhealth failed to use its P600 billion-worth funding.

“Not a single patient of PhilHealth [benefited],” he added.

“Despite how much money they have, nothing happened, So why should we add to it?” Escudero said.

Unfair, potentially unconstitutional

For her part, Sen. Risa Hontiveros expressed alarm over the bicameral conference committee’s move, saying that denying PhilHealth support to pay the premium contribution of the most vulnerable would be to deny Filipinos the right to health.

“This zero subsidy is unfair, illegal, and potentially unconstitutional. How about Filipinos who cannot pay their premium contributions? This is a major blow to our goal of having universal healthcare in the country,” Hontiveros said in a mix of English and Filipino.

According to the opposition senator, the government has an obligation to pay for the “premiums” of indirect contributors including the poor, senior citizens, and persons with disabilities.

Sen. Christopher Go likewise denounced the conferees’ decision, saying he had strong reservations about it.

“As vice chair of the Senate committee on finance and chair of the Senate committee on health, I first want to make sure that every peso of the people is used correctly and that health programs are adequately funded,” Go said in Filipino.

“Marami po ang naghihirap at marami ang nagugutom. Hindi tayo papayag na maisantabi lamang ang ating mga adhikain na ipinaglalaban para maproteksyunan ang kalusugan at buhay ng bawat Pilipino,” he added.

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“Many are suffering and many are hungry. We will not allow our aspirations to be put aside to protect the health and life of every Filipinosga gaming,” he added.

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