Sen. Grace Poe (Screen grab/Senate PRIB)
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) must immediately settle the unpaid claims of hundreds of hospitals, Sen. Grace Poe said on Friday, as she warned that the state insurer’s failure to do so would put in jeopardy the country’s pandemic response.
“PhilHealth should pay up. Hospitals are battlegrounds in this fight against COVID-19. They need what’s due to them, especially in this time when a number of them are overwhelmed with patients due to the recent surge of infections,” the chair of the Senate public services committee said.
In a statement, Poe cited reports that in Western Visayas alone, including Iloilo City, claims of hospitals and laboratories had reached over P800 million.
Local executives in those areas had appealed to the national government to address the lack of hospital beds, dwindling medical staff, inadequate vaccine supply, shortage of medicines and the slack in PhilHealth’s settling its dues.
“Being reimbursed of their rightful claims would capacitate hospitals to fully respond to the needs of their patients—both COVID-19 and non-COVID-19,” Poe said.
The senator said PhilHealth “owes it to its members to be able to deal with the challenges hounding its system to reimburse hospitals.”
The state health insurer implemented a debit-credit payment method starting April supposedly to fast-track the payment of claims and make sure all health claims were valid.
Poe said PhilHealth management should review the new system to determine if it was fast and efficient enough.
“Lives are on the line every day. The people should be able to rely on the promises of the state health insurer amid the health crisis,” she added. INQ