FOR the second year in a row, the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has cut its proposed budget for the Health Facilities Enhancement Program (HFEP) of the Department of Health (DOH) due to a low budget utilization rate.
Under the proposed P4.1-trillion national budget submitted by the DBM to Congress, the budget department is proposing only P5.86 billion for HFEP, particularly for medical equipment. This is 63 percent lower than its budget allocation under the 2019 General Appropriations Act (GAA) at P15.87 billion, which already includes funding for infrastructure and motor vehicle.
While the DBM is also proposing an unprogrammed appropriation of P5.44 billion for HFEP under the 2020 National Expenditure Program (NEP), the total figure for both programmed and unprogrammed appropriations for HFEP next year will still not exceed its 2019 budget allocation. Nonetheless, this unprogrammed appropriation of P5.44 billion for HFEP, if approved by Congress, shall be used for the construction, upgrading, expansion, rehabilitation and/or repair of, and land acquisition for barangay health stations, health units, local government unit hospitals, regional medical centers, dangerous drug abuse treatment and rehabilitation centers and other health-care facilities. However, priority should be given to those located in or are near areas where there are large numbers of poor families or where there are no health-care facilities that can provide affordable and quality health care.
The P5.44-billion HFEP fund may only be released subject to the certification from DOH secretary attesting that the projects are part of the Philippine Health Facility Development Plan (2017-2022), according to the special provision for HFEP specified under the 2020 NEP.
Furthermore, it is also noted
that it is subject to Special Provision No. 1, which states that the
unprogrammed appropriations may be used when any of the following exists: a)
excess revenue collections in any one of the identified nontax
revenue sources from its corresponding collection target; b) new revenue
collections or those arising from new tax or nontax resources which are not
part of, nor in the original revenue sources; c) approved loans for
foreign-assisted projects.
During the budget hearing last week with the Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC), former Health Secretary and now Iloilo first District Rep. Janette Garin expressed concern over the budget cut in HFEP as she questioned the move to shift to cash-based budgeting system.
“I can see that the HFEP funding, your honor, is only P5 billion so what will the enrolled members do once they arrive at the hospital with no medicines, no doctors, no equipment or no PhilHealth accreditation? It defeats the purpose of services transcending to our people,” Garin said.
“We know we have the President’s directive [on cash-based budgeting system] but the President, having been a former mayor who was very keen on seeing to it that national service should be felt by people, will agree in saying that people’s future and the services to the people should not be sacrificed just because there is a non-performing secretary that handled the specific department,” she added.
Responding to Garin, DBM Acting Secretary Wendel E. Avisado attributed the budget cut to the low HFEP budget utilization rate of DOH.
“You know, we always make sure our move has basis. In the case of DOH on their HFEP, the truth is they still have funds and we are looking at their utilization, their performance. For example in 2018, out of the total funds available, utilization was only 35 percent. In 2017, it’s 17 percent and 2019, 17 percent,” Avisado said.
HFEP is aimed at upgrading priority Barangay Health Stations and Regional Health Units to provide Basic Emergency Obstetric and NewBorn Care services and thus reduce maternal mortality; and to upgrade government hospitals and health facilities in provinces to make them more responsive to the health needs of the population, among other purposes.
In the 2019 NEP submitted by DBM under then Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno, HFEP was only given a proposed budget allocation of P50 million, a far cry from the P30 billion allocated under the 2018 General Appropriations Act.
The DBM cited the “dismal spending performance” of DOH in the implementation of HFEP as the main reason for the budget cut.
Image credits: AP/Bullit Marquez