The House of Representatives has ratified the reconciled version of the proposed medical scholarship and return service program proposal that the Committee on Health shepherded to swift passage by the House Committee on Health in the chamber.
Committee chairperson Quezon Rep. Helen Tan hailed the approval of the measure to be known as the “Doktor Para sa Bayan Act” that she authored in the House.
Tan thanked newly installed Speaker Lord Allan Velasco for the swift ratification of the bicameral conference committee report on the bill which seeks to address the shortage of doctors in the country.
Ratification came three days after Tan won back chairmanship of the health panel. She was relieved from the post last week as a result of the bitter speakership squabble between Velasco and ousted Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano.
The bill was passed last August in the House as House Bill 6756 which consolidated 19 legislative proposals seeking to address the shortage of medical practitioners in the country.
“The medical scholarship and return service program for deserving students has now become even more important in the face of the current COVID-19 pandemic. I do not doubt that the enactment of this measure is one of the enormously significant reforms which time has come,” Tan said.
She underscored the need to enact this measure into law not only as a complementary measure to the Universal Health Care Act but as a way of honoring the sacrifices of many frontliner doctors whose precious lives had been claimed by the current war against the pandemic.
In response to the current COVID-19 crisis, Tan introduced an amendment that made its way in the final version of the approved bill making service in public health office or government hospital in times of pandemic or public health emergency as one of the conditions for the grant of medical scholarship.
Tan said that this important health legislation stems from her constant engagement in numerous medical missions that started even before her foray into politics.
“The bill, which is one of the early legislations that I crafted during my first term is among my priority legislative measures and is my personal response to what I have seen as an enormously urgent need of the masses of our people for medical services, especially those living in the remote areas. The medical scholarship and return service program is the best possible solution in addressing the need of the marginalized Filipinos for the provision of professional healthcare services in the country,” she said.
The Doktor Para sa Bayan Act stands on the twin strategies of providing free medical education and mandatory rendering of professional medical services as a form of co-payment for medical scholarship.
Under the bill, a Medical Scholarship and Return Service Program will be established in SUCs or in higher education institutions where there are no SUC’s offering a medical course.
At least one scholar from every municipality in the country will be entitled to the scholarship.
The financial assistance for Filipino students who want to pursue a degree in medicine will cover free tuition and other school fees; allowances for prescribed books, supplies, and equipment, clothing or uniform, allowance for dormitory an transportation, internship fee, medical board review, and annual medical insurance.
In return, the scholar shall undertake a mandatory service in a government hospital or any local health office in the student’s hnometown for a period equivalent to at last four years for those who have availed of a four year program and seven years to those who have availed of five year scholarship program.