‘400-percent budget hike needed for PH to copy Cuban health care’

Health Secretary Paulyn Ubial on Tuesday said government need to increase its health budget 400 percent if only for the Philippines to be at par with the Cuban model of health care.

During the appropriations hearing of the DOH and its attached agencies’ proposed P144 billion budget in 2017, Ubial said the country only spent six percent of its national budget on health, whereas Cuba, known for its free and quality health care subsidized by government, allocates as much as 28 percent of its budget.

Ubial led a Philippine delegation’s study visit in Cuba last week to visit the health care and training institutions in the socialist state.

READ: Cuban health care system awes Pinoys

“If we’re going to match or raise that to the Cuban model, we need to infuse about another four times, 400 percent of the budget,” Ubial told the lawmakers.

Ubial added that the per capita expenditure for health in the Philippines is at $76, way below that of Cuba at a whopping $460.

She said the Philippines’ doctor-to-population ratio is one doctor per 33,000, while Cuba’s doctor-to-population ratio is one doctor per 1,075 population.

“With regard to the Cuban model, their strength is human resource development…We can’t produce that many doctors that Cuba is producing,” Ubial said.

Asked by Kabayan Rep. Harry Roque if it’s possible to achieve universal health care within the term of President Rodrigo Duterte, Ubial said it remains to be the department’s dream.

“That is our dream. The real question is if there are resources available to us. We believe that we can deploy the health workers and provide the drugs and medicines to our people if we’re given enough resources by government,” Ubial said. CDG