Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) reported on Wednesday that for the first semester, the agency has spent P4,644,615,997.03 to pay for medicines, hospital bills and medical treatments of patients, an increase of 30.62% compared with the same period last year.
Assistant General Manager for Charity Sector Dr. Larry Cedro said the top three nature of requests is hospital confinement where the agency released P2.03 billion for 93,531 patients; next is chemotherapy at P1.015 billion for 26,009 patients, and medicines at P888.4 million for 72,138 patients.
Other nature of requests includes dialysis (hemodialysis and peritoneal), implant/ prosthesis/ medical devices, laboratory and diagnostic procedures, surgery, radiation treatment, laser treatment, medical appliances, therapy, transplant, and others.
Meanwhile, in response to Commission on Audit (CoA)’s warning against the agency over “questionable” transactions worth more than P10.17 billion intended for charity and programs and medical assistance, Cedro revealed that there’s really a spike in terms of the number of individuals asking assistance from PCSO.
Cedro further revealed that while measures are being adopted to abide by COA’s observation and even PCSO has established parameters, the individuals asking assistance from PCSO continue to increase.
Members of PhilHealth must have sufficient regularity of premium contributions to ensure that they are able to avail themselves of social health insurance benefits in accredited health care institutions.
PhilHealth emphasized that eligibility to benefits means that a member must have made at least three months’ contribution within the immediate six months prior to the first day of confinement.
In addition, a member must also have sufficient regularity of premium contribution and should not be subject to legal penalties. Members shall be also referred to its case rates.
At present, PCSO are discouraging patients or relatives to “appeal” for additional grants once they have reached the maximum approved medical assistance. It has also developed schemes to further adapt and somehow compliment to what PhilHealth is doing.
