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Saturday, September 03, 2005
Cuenco suspends health program aid
By Linette C. Ramos
Sun.Star Staff Reporter
Following the implementation of tighter audit rules on their pork barrel, a Cebu City congressman is suspending his health program for indigent patients at a government hospital.
Rep. Antonio Cuenco (Cebu City, south) said he is cutting his aid to the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center (VSMMC) until the alleged irregular disbursements from his funds by the hospital is resolved.
Cuenco said the rules the Commission on Audit (COA) implemented starting this year are too strict that some indigents are not able to benefit from his Priority Development Assistance Funds (PDAF) allocation.
Cuenco and Rep. Raul del Mar (Cebu City, north) allocate P10 million each annually for their health programs at VSMMC.
“I stopped allocating for my health program at Sotto precisely because COA has become very strict with how it is spent. The indigent patients are at a losing end,” Cuenco told Sun.Star Cebu.
He said he will wait for COA to complete its inquiry on the alleged irregularities and for the commission and VSMMC to come up with clear-cut rules on how their PDAF should be spent before he restores his allocation for indigent patients.
Depleted
In an interview last Thursday, VSMMC Chief Filomena delos Santos admitted that their funds from the congressmen’s PDAF are already depleted, “the remaining amount is very negligible.”
COA is now looking into the alleged lapses of VSMMC officials in allowing the release of some P3 million of the Cebuano legislators’ PDAF to pay for medicines that patients bought from accredited private drugstores.
One of COA’s new rules is that indigent patients may avail themselves only of the services and medicines within VSMMC.
The legislators are already prohibited from reimbursing expenses for medicines bought from drugstores outside the hospital.
Because of this, del Mar said he would also be forced to cut his assistance to VSMMC from P10 million to P5 million a year.
The other P5 million, he said, would go to the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) 7, where indigent patients could request for medicines.
“There is no anomaly whatsoever involving my PDAF with VSMMC, that’s why I’m not stopping it, I will only be reducing the amount effective this year. COA disallowed the purchase of medicines outside VSMMC, but we also have to help the patients who need it,” del Mar said.
Requirement
Indigent patients from the city’s north district can continue to avail themselves of VSMMC’s services and medicines through del Mar’s health program, provided they comply with all the requirements and rules set by COA.
Patients need to secure a referral slip from the congressman’s district office and prescription from their attending physician before a medical procedure or the medicines are released.
Medicines that are not available at the VSMMC will be purchased through DSWD 7.
(September 3, 2005 issue)
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