Hontiveros lobbies for health care reforms
LIBERAL Party (LP) senatorial aspirant Risa Hontiveros met with health care reform advocates and urban poor groups in Cebu to seek their support and discuss her agenda yesterday.
Hontiveros, who’s running for senator for the third time, said she wants to establish six pillars or building blocks for a universal health care system for all Filipinos.
These include designating a doctor in each barangay, affordable medicines and health care services, empowerment of barangay health workers (BHWs) and health education for the people.
“Wherever I am, I will be a lifetime advocate for universal health care based on my experience before in enacting different laws for health until my one year as member of the board of directors of PhilHealth (ends),” she told reporters.
She had a short press conference at the office of Cebu City Councilor Alvin Dizon yesterday morning, where they met with local advocates, representatives of urban poor groups and homeowners associations.
Hontiveros said the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth), as a health insurance and financing institution, is already a pillar toward a universal health care system.
She said 88 percent of Filipinos are already enrolled in its programs and that they’ll just have to go after 12 million more people who are not yet enrolled as members.
She said she hopes that eventually, all members will be covered by PhilHealth as well as the entire amounts they have to pay for health services.
Disclaimer: The comments uploaded on this site do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of management and owner of Cebudailynews. We reserve the right to exclude comments that we deem to be inconsistent with our editorial standards.
