PGH admin finds P5.9-B budget ‘more than enough’

The administration of the Philippine General Hospital (PGH), contradicting a call by the hospital’s union to double the funding for the state-run medical institution, said on Tuesday the allocation for PGH under the proposed 2023 budget is “more than enough.”

Dr. Jonas del Rosario, PGH spokesperson, also clarified that the proposed budget for the hospital is P5.9 billion, not P5.4 billion as earlier reported.

“This is [still] definitely lower than the two previous years, simply because we have not really spent some of the budget that was given to us last year,” he said in a phone interview.

“That’s why we were hesitant to ask for more because not all [the money was] spent,” he added.

According to Del Rosario, PGH Director Dr. Gerardo Legaspi also agreed that the proposed allocation is “more than enough” to fund the hospital’s priority programs, particularly its free medical services for indigent patients.

Decline in allocations

The University of the Philippines (UP) System, which includes PGH, was allotted P23.1 billion in the P5.268-trillion proposed national budget for 2023 submitted to Congress last week.

Like the state hospital, the UP System was given less than its current P25.6-billion budget.

PGH, the country’s main referral center for COVID-19, saw its yearly allocations reduced since the pandemic hit the country in 2020.

It was given P6.9 billion in the General Appropriations Act of 2021, the first enacted national budget following the pandemic, then P6.3 billion for this year.

Thus, the proposed P5.9 billion for next year is a further reduction from those amounts.

Del Rosario, however, noted that PGH originally asked for P6.1 billion, which should cover “infrastructure development,” including plans for the expansion of its facilities, he said.

“We’re confident and we’re hoping that it will be given to us when the budget deliberations happen in the Congress,” Del Rosario said.

‘Better health services’

Reached for comment, Karen Faurillo, president of the All UP Workers Union-Manila/PGH, issued a statement to the Inquirer saying that “we take note and respect the position that the PGH administration is assuming, but we, as a union, maintain that a bigger budget would benefit the public and the services PGH offers.”

Over the weekend, the union criticized the proposed budget for PGH as “anti-health worker” and called for that allotment to be doubled to P10 billion.

The group cited the need to help more indigent patients, upgrade the facilities and equipment at PGH, hire as many as 500 nurses and regularize more than 300 contractuals.

“A P10-billion budget would translate to better health services for patients and help ensure our health workers’ benefits and welfare,” Faurillo said in a statement by the union on Saturday night.

Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire, officer in charge of the Department of Health, said earlier that the department was also backing calls for more funding for the state hospital.

“If they [Congress] will heed our call, we hope that they will increase the budget of PGH so [it] will become more efficient,” Vergeire said at a press briefing last week.

“[This way], they can also expand their… access, especially [to] highly technical services,” she added. INQ