PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte vowed to provide P50 million each month as additional assistance to the newly launched Malasakit Center in the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center.
However, it has yet to be determined which agency will receive the aid, said Department of Health (DOH) 7 Director Jaime Bernadas.
Five other hospitals in Central Visayas will also launch their own centers in a few months from now. These are the St. Anthony Mother and Child Hospital in Cebu City, Eversley Child’s Sanitarium and General Hospital in Mandaue City, Talisay District Hospital in Talisay City, and Gov. Celestino Gallares Hospital and Don Emilio del Valle Memorial Hospital in Bohol.
Presidential Assistant for the Visayas Michael Dino said the Malasakit Center aims to bring government hospital services closer to indigent patients, as well as the services of the DOH, Department of Social Welfare and Development, Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO), Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation and the Philippine Health Insurance Corp.
Alexander Balutan, PCSO general manager, said they can provide P50,000 worth of financial assistance per patient through the center.
They can even provide more than the prescribed amount depending on the approval of the PCSO board and the need of the patient, he said.
Dino said that since they introduced the program, some 2,000 patients have received financial assistance.
Dino said the Malasakit Center will soon be replicated in Eastern and Western Visayas.
Aside from the launching of the Malasakit Center, Duterte also witnessed the turnover of 1,000 personal computers donated by business process outsourcing companies for elementary students living in far-flung barangays and island towns in the region.