Team Rama questions additional health workers

PESQUERA

THE Team Rama bloc in the Cebu City Council questioned plans by the Osmeña administration to hire additional job order personnel (JOs) to implement some of the city’s programs in the barangays next year.

During yesterday’s budget hearing, the Department of Social Welfare and Services (DSWS) asked for P21.3 million to pay for the salaries of 600 JOs under the Long Life Medical Assistance Program of Mayor Tomas Osmeña.

Under the program, City Hall personnel will visit the houses of city residents to give them free maintenance medicines.

The other P1.3 million will fund additional JOs for the City Hospitalization and Medicine Assistance Program (Champ).

Peter Visitaction, head of the Long Life Medical Assistance Program, said the JOs to be hired will include couriers, encoders, family health workers, medicine checkers and evaluators.

“This program is focusing on maintenance medicines namely hypertension, diabetes and arthritis. This is the core reason we’re adopting other individuals to give the medicine,” he said.

But Councilor Raymond Garcia, vice chairperson of the Committee on Budget and Finance, said the proposal seems redundant.

“I feel that some of these jobs can be done by the barangays. Why pay for more people when there are existing workforce in the barangays? You can work with the barangay officials when it comes to delivery of medicines,” he said.

Councilor Joy Pesquera, who heads the Committee on Budget and Finance, agreed saying it is a duplication of the work done by the City Health Office and the barangay health workers (BHWs).

Pesquera questioned the need for daily delivery of the medicines when it can be scheduled twice a month and the beneficiaries can claim it at the barangay hall. The DSWS is proposing a P411.9 million budget for 2017.

A large portion of the proposed amount will go to their medical assistance programs, which include the Champ and the Long Life Medical Assistance Program.