FINANCE Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III admitted that the information system of Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) does not allow them to make secure projections on its fund life as it is “in shambles.”
Dominguez told reporters that they have already made this known to PhilHealth since October last year.
“And now they’re arguing about spending P2.1 billion on an information system, when in fact they spent close to P200 billion and…their information system is not, it’s not robust enough to capture all the data,” he said.
“So we’re saying, number one, they have to improve their information system so we can make, not only a one-year projection, but a 10-year projection for PhilHealth. So as of now, I will take their word that probably by late 2021 or late, 2022, they may run out of money,” he added.
This is why Dominguez said the government has allocated around P70 billion to P80 billion to subsidize PhilHealth this year.
However, in the long term, he agreed that the administration of PhilHealth must be fixed “in order to be able to get a good handle of what exactly their liabilities and fund life are.”
Dominguez’s remarks came days after PhilHealth Acting Senior Vice President Nerissa R. Santiago revealed that the Covid-19 impact slashed the agency’s actuarial life to just one year from more than 10 years before the pandemic hit the country.
Santiago also said in a Senate hearing that PhilHealth may collapse in 2022 should it get no additional funding from the government as it needed to increase benefit payouts despite declining collections.
Officials deny pocketing P15B
In a related development, PhilHealth also strongly denied on Thursday that its senior officials have “pocketed” some P15 billion as alleged by its former anti-fraud officer who recently resigned.
“The Philippine Health Insurance Corporation [PhilHealth]categorically denies in strongest terms that its senior officials have ‘pocketed’ some P15 billion as alleged by Thorsson Keith during the Senate hearing on August 4, 2020,” it said in a statement.
“His malicious claims not substantiated by evidence were obviously made to malign officers that rejected his ambitions for higher offices which he is not qualified for,” he said.
Moreover, PhilHealth said the fund alluded to by Keith was the Interim Reimbursement Mechanism (IRM) that was released to a total of 711 health-care facilities to ensure efficient and timely response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The state health insurer also debunked the alleged favoritism in the release of funds to hospitals.
It has also since pointed out that the IRM is governed by government accounting and auditing rules, hence, it is subject to liquidation by its recipients.
“The PhilHealth regional offices have been given the flexibility in the timing of liquidations recognizing the situations in each hospital,” it said.
“It is worthy to note that in recognition of the crucial help that the IRM plays in the fight against Covid-19, the Philippine Hospital Association, in a statement, expressed their support to its implementation in all levels of hospitals [including infirmaries]to help them to financially cope with the demands of increasing its capacity to respond to Covid-19,” it added.