Media

How fast it can reimburse hospitals for COVID-19 screening is the “new speed test” that PhilHealth should pass to debunk mounting complaints that it had been slow in paying frontline facilities.  This challenge was hurled by Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto at...

How to make Interim Reimbursement Mechanism (IRM) releases transparent and open to scrutiny? Post them in the PhilHealth website, which requires no expensive IT software to do. Enumerate the basic data: amount, date of release, recipient institutions and their facility capacity,...

After admitting that it has only 16 auditors deployed at PhilHealth, Sen. Ralph Recto expects the Commission on Audit “to hang up ‘help wanted’ signs” to recruit accountants who will beef up the “COA detachment” in the embattled state health insurer.  “Kahit one auditor...

Whoever are fired or hired, these must be done: 1) More than special audit, PhilHealth requires constant audit. I doubt if COA auditors in that agency number more than 25. Too small for a P140-billion-a-year agency, which transacts 35,000 claims a day from 8,500 hospitals and...

We lost P1.4 trillion during the first half. About P10.8 billion daily from April to June alone. The economy is gasping in the ER and a more robust stimulus package is the ventilator that it needs. A comprehensive health response, especially testing, which in turn will rebuild...

Moves to boost the nation’s health defenses during the “timeout” are needed not only to stop the pandemic from reaching its tipping point, “but also to get the country ready for another calamity – typhoons.” “Kung ang COVID-19 ay isang unos, may mga bagyo pang parating,” Senate...

It is a doctor’s prescription with side effects. But if it will cure the patient and prevent medical personnel from falling ill, then there’s no choice but to follow it.  It will be the government’s job to manage the side effects – specifically the tremendous whiplash...

I will not rush to conclude that these are doctored data. What I would ask of them is a better explanation of the methodology used. And a breakdown, per town, so it will give us a high-resolution picture. Let academics vet and validate it for our enlightenment, to confirm if the...