Senators on Wednesday, February 1 called on the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) to provide the country's overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) some leeway on their premium contributions to help them with their finances.
Senator Joseph Victor "JV" Ejercito said the government should subsidize half of the premium contributions of OFW members as a compromise.
This way, Ejercito said OFWs will only have to pay half of the contributions, while half would be shouldered by the government.
"That's the compromise that I see. Let's study if that’s possible," Ejercito said during the Senate Committee on Health and Demography's hearing on the Universal Health Care (UHC) implementation.
During the hearing, PhilHealth acting president Emmanuel Ledesma Jr. pointed out only the families of the OFWs who are left in the country benefit from their contributions.
But if an OFW gets hospitalized abroad, they can apply for a reimbursement of their hospital in the Philippines.
“If an OFW that is confined in a hospital abroad, he or she can claim for reimbursement with the hospital expenses here in the Philippines," said PhilHealth executive vice president Eli Santos.
"All that are needed are documents pertaining to the hospitalization of that OFW,” he also said.
Ejercito reiterated there is a need to amend the UHC law to make it more responsive to the current needs of Filipinos.
The senator earlier filed a bill amending Republic Act No. 11223 or the Universal Health Care (UHC) Act.
“The reason why we propose the amendments is because we only realized the flaws and the necessary adjustments that are needed once it was implemented. There is no perfect law. UHC is a work in progress,”
In filing Senate Bill No. 160, Ejercito said there is a need to repeal the penalty interest of missed PhilHealth contributions of self-earning, professional practitioners and migrant workers.
Under the bill, distressed or repatriated migrant workers shall not be required to pay their missed PhilHealth contributions.
"To the OFWs and our workers, I hope they will understand that at the time we were drafting the law, I did not anticipate the pandemic. The world’s economy, the Philippine economy was good," he said.
"The data, the numbers that we used as reference was based on the circumstances at the time. But because of the pandemic, it is not only the Philippines, it is not only our workers that struggled but the whole world. That is why we have to adapt to the whole situation,” the lawmaker added.
Sen. Raffy Tulfo, chairman of the Senate Committee on Migrant Workers said he supports a version of the UHC law that will exempt OFWs from mandatory PhilHealth contribution.
“It has come to my attention the alarming fact that the Universal Health Care Act, this important piece of legislation, has failed to address their needs," Tulfo said.
"That is why I am here today to support the proposals for an amendment to the Universal Health Care Law, one that will address specific needs of our migrant workers and provide them with the support and protection they require,” he further said.
"I believe that we should exempt migrant workers from the requirement to pay contributions to PhilHealth. As it stands, these workers are paying into a system that does not fully address their health care needs due to the nature of their work and their status as overseas workers. This is simply unacceptable and it is time for us to provide them with a solution that works for them,” Tulfo stressed.