A health advocacy group yesterday objected to the government's plan to divert billions of baht in funding from the universal health coverage scheme and the Public Health Ministry to finance upgrading the employment status of 45,684 contract health care workers.
The People's Health Systems Movement yesterday sent an open letter to Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha objecting to the government's plan to divert 2.4 billion baht from the universal health coverage scheme's budget and 938.4 million from the Public Health Ministry's budget to fund the employment upgrade plan.
The plan is part of the government's 100.3 billion baht budget redistribution bill, approved by the cabinet on Tuesday as a financial mechanism to support the government's handling of the Covid-19 outbreak and mitigating its impact on the public, said the group.
The 2.4 billion baht from the health care scheme was eyed to cover the health care costs of 49 million people insured under the health care scheme, which is normally paid to hospitals in capitated budgets, said the group.
The 938.4 million baht in the ministry's budget, meanwhile, was intended for funding building and maintenance or renovation of hospital buildings, not for nonessential activities like funding seminars or study trips that can be cancelled, said the group.
The number of patients visiting hospitals under the universal health coverage scheme may momentarily decrease as people have been asked to delay appointments for the sake of Covid-19 transmission prevention.
That, however, doesn't necessarily mean the hospitals have a lower financial burden or workload, said the group.
The group called on the cabinet to consider revising this budget diversion plan.
But Sukhum Karnchanapimai, permanent secretary for public health, said the plan was unlikely to affect the health care scheme's operations as the National Health Security Office (NHSO) is still allowed to request additional funding if necessary.
The NHSO had sought 5.1 billion and 5 billion baht in additional funding in 2018 and 2019 respectively, he said, adding the office had only recently received 3.2 billion from the central budget to fund its handling of Covid-19 related work such as laboratory testing.
Dr Sukhum also said the ministry's next budgetary diversion to the pooled fund for fighting Covid-19 totalled 1.2 billion baht, and would unlikely be disbursed on time this fiscal year, resulting in its return to the Bureau of the Budget. The funds were intended for demolition work and constructing a new building, which cannot be carried out due to the partial business lockdown, said Dr Sukhum.
Meanwhile, Phumtham Wechayachai, an adviser to opposition leader Sompong Amornwiwat from the Pheu Thai Party, said the six opposition parties would send a letter to Gen Prayut calling on him to request a special parliamentary session to debate the government's plan to spend a substantial sum to combat the Covid-19 outbreak.
The opposition want to ensure transparency in and efficiency of the government's planned spending especially as such large sums were involved, he said.
