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Wednesday, November 02, 2005
Gwen shuts out towns still without Philhealth programs
Capitol will no longer release financial assistance to towns and barangays that have not met the deadline for its Philhealth insurance program for indigent families of the province.
The towns were given until the middle of this year to submit names and documents needed for the enrolment of qualified constituents, but until now, several towns still failed to comply.
The Provincial Government imposed the deadline after Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia told officials of the towns and component cities to enroll with Philhealth the indigent families in their respective areas.
Counterpart
As its counterpart, Capitol will shoulder the enrolment of an equivalent number of families enrolled by each town.
The program is expected to benefit some 70,000 families in the whole province.
“For every delay, we have denied health services to those that need help the most and these are the more economically deprived constituents of the province. How else can we pressure everybody to act? This is not for me, but for their (officials) constituents,” Garcia said.
Because of this, Garcia has issued a memorandum stating that unless there is a certification from the Integrated Provincial Health Office that a town or city has complied with the Philhealth requirement, no financial assistance shall be released.
The financial assistance will come from the newly approved second supplemental budget, which allotted P50 million financial assistance each to towns and barangays.
Irritated
During her birthday celebration last month, Garcia distributed Philhealth cards to only seven of the close to 40 towns and cities that committed to join the program.
“I got so irritated to say the least. This is the first time that we are embarking on this program. The process has been even made easier so we can immediately issue IDs but still they failed to complete it,” she said.
The Philhealth insurance programs aims at giving the indigents easier access to the health service that they need.
This program will also make district hospitals earn and give free services to indigents. (MBG)
(November 2, 2005 issue)
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