Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) chief Ricardo Morales should be relieved from his post to stop the corrupt practices and activities in the state insurance agency, Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC) Commissioner Greco Belgica said on Tuesday.

“Kung si General Morales po ay hindi aalisin, hindi po maalis ang problema, dahil mula ulo hanggang paa ang corruption sa PhilHealth, (If General Morales is not fired, the problem will not go away because corruption in PhilHealth is rampant from the top, down to the bottom),” Belgica said at the resumption of the Senate's hearing on the alleged anomalies hounding PhilHealth.

According to Belgica, there is excessive corruption in PhilHealth that the agency is losing P2 to P3-billion weekly which is primarily due to its lack of a validation system.

“Walang validation mechanism. Bayad ng bayad ang PhilHealth na parang mga tanga (They have no validation mechanism. PhilHealth is paying for hospital claims foolishly),” Belgica said during the hearing.

“Dahil rito, namimiligro tayong mawalan ng pondo. Kung grabe ang sakit ng Pilipino, mas grabe ang sakit ng PhilHealth (Because of this, the agency is in danger of losing funds. If Filipinos are seriously sick, PhilHealth is in a worse state),” he added.

“Ang IT system na ginagamit ng PhilHealth has no validation mechanism kaya nama-manipulate ng mga empleyado, ospital. Hindi chine-check ng PhilHealth kung totoo yung claims nila (PhilHealth’s IT system has no validation mechanism that is why its employees, the hospitals are manipulating it. PhilHealth is not checking whether these claims are valid),” he said.

He said some private entities and even state-run financial institutions like Landbank and Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) have offered to provide PhilHealth an external validation mechanism at no cost to the government in the past but PhilHealth turned down those offers.

“Hindi nila tinanggap kasi maapektuhan ang pinagkakakitaan nila (They won’t accept it because it will affect their money-making schemes),” he lamented.

Belgica appeared in the Senate committee of the whole’s hearing on PhilHealth anomalies a week after some of its officials testified that the agency may lose its reserve funds by 2021 due to the expected decrease in premium contributions and increasing payouts for COVID-19 patients.

Should the COVID-19 pandemic persist, PhilHealth officials said the agency will cease operations in 2022 unless the government provides subsidy to keep its operations running.

Belgica said the PACC is currently investigating PhilHealth and is preparing to file cases against some of its officials before the Office of the Ombudsman.

“Mahaba po ang listahan ng mga iimbestigahan namin. Wala kaming palulusutin (We have a long list of investigation. We will not spare anyone),” the PACC official said.