Health budget in Cebu City cut by P140M

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

CEBU CITY – The Cebu City Health Department (CHD) is the second City Hall department to complain that the slash in the 2012 budget will gravely affect their daily operations.

Department head Dr. Stella Ygoña presented to reporters Tuesday how services of the CHD will be affected by the reduction of the budget for field services, from the proposed P278.9 million to P138.9 million.

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“With the minimal budget, we will really have a hard time so we will just have to focus on prevention and education,” said Ygoña.

She has also instructed barangay health workers to inform barangay captains about the slashed budget, in case the village chiefs complain about the insufficient medicines in the barangay health centers.

The health department’s maintenance and other operating expenses (MOOE) budget for field services was reduced to P23.3 million from the proposed P163.4 million.

The item that was greatly reduced was for drugs and medicines. CHD proposed P133 million but only P20 million was approved.

Ygoña explained that in arriving at the “ideal” P133-million proposal, they were hoping to serve majority of the population.

Target

But the department was able to reduce this to just P40 million to serve the “poorest of the poor.” Despite the reduction, the department is still short by P20 million.

Ygoña has instructed her staff to maximize the budget appropriation and just report back to the City for additional funds.

Among the services that will be affected — unless a supplemental budget is passed in time — is the City’s Operation Tuli or free circumcisions project.

Ygoña expects that if the City will pass a supplemental budget, it will be after summer. But the program is scheduled for the summer, so that boys who avail themselves of the services would not have to miss classes.

The operational budget for the operation is only P300,000.

This means that only 20 boys from each barangay will be able to avail themselves of the free circumcision.

On the average, CHD’s circumcision program serves 6,000 boys per barangay every year.

“We may have to outsource the program to our partners in the private organizations,” Ygoña lamented.

The Cebu City Council slashed the budget to P5.2 billion from the proposed P11.8 billion, because the executive department failed to produce the sources of funds to back the large proposal.

Saddened

The department does not have much problem with the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases (STD) because the P1-million proposal was approved, and the CHD has enough partners in international organizations that provide aid for the Human Immunodeficiency Virus–Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV-Aids) programs of the City.

However, CHD is over P5 million short each in the City’s rabies control and maternal health care services.

The department served 4,692 clients for rabies vaccination last year. Each victim needed P1,388 for five shots of anti-rabies vaccine. The department needed P6.5 million for the program, but only P1 million was approved.

The reduction of the budget for maternal health care “deeply saddened” Ygoña because the program was supposed to translate to neonatal health.
CHD proposed P15 million, but only P10 million was approved.

Child care

This includes purchase of iron supplements, management of common infections during pregnancy, post-partum care and actual deliveries.

Child health care is also short by close to P3 million. Only P4 million was approved from the P6.9 million proposed that would cover management of infants with low birth weight, diarrhea, urinary tract infection and pneumonia.

CHD recorded a rising trend in deaths of children due to pneumonia and diarrhea, although, the diarrhea cases have been reduced.

From 2009 to 2011, pneumonia deaths have consistently increased from 121 to 130 to 134. The number of cases shows the same trend, with 2,284 in 2009 to 2,880 in 2010 and 3,702 last year.

For the last three years, diarrhea deaths also rose from 26 in 2009 to 48 in 2010 and 55 last year. The number of incidents the last three years were 5,251; 4,682; and 1,547; respectively.

The other affected programs are dengue prevention, tuberculosis in children, nutrition and healthy lifestyle. (Sun.Star Cebu)