Health scheme 'at risk from NHSO carve-up'
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The universal health scheme is under attack from five distinct groups who want to profit from its budget allocation through corruption, a board member of the National Health Security Office (NHSO) claimed today.
Dr Wichai Chokewiwat said these identities aimed to achieve this through reform of the NHSO in a way that would give them power.
Wichai named the groups as: first – old powers in the Public Health Ministry leadership; second – foreign pharmaceutical giants; third – private hospitals under NHSO contracts; fourth – doctors and medical personnel wanting to benefit from post-NHSO deals with medical firms and private hospitals; and fifth – corrupt politicians.
Wichai’s statement yesterday echoed a warning earlier this month by Rural Doctors Foundation chairman Dr Kriangsak Watcharanukoolkiat. He said some politicians were trying to abort the scheme, which was initiated as Bt30 universal healthcare and is currently regulated by the NHSO as the gold-care healthcare scheme.
Wichai said old-school senior officials wanted to resume power to allocate the budget for and run the independent NHSO as the ministry’s subordinate unit. The foreign medical firms did not want to sell drugs at lower prices to Thailand, especially anti-Aids/HIV drugs, or through compulsory licensing.
Private hospitals believed that a per-head subsidy through the NHSO scheme would be higher if it was run under a new structure, which would be detrimental to the public but would benefit organisations run by corrupt figures, Wichai said.
The doctor said the World Health Organisation was watching the progress of Thailand’s health security system and monitoring an upcoming election of the NHSO board and its sub-panel.
The NHSO will soon elect members of a new board. Wichai said members representing the public or doctors serving the people’s benefit were likely to be replaced by those wanting to grab power.
Board member Nimit Thian-udom said decisions by a new NHSO board could have wide-ranging effects: “For example, if a decision is given for a Bt1 rise in per-head subsidy, it will result in an increase of Bt48 million each year,” he added.
An amendment to the existing law means the public would be better represented on the NHSO’s board, and have more say in the election of sub-panels. “This is not the public grabbing power in the NHSO for themselves, but a more balanced counterweight to the NHSO’s administration,” he added.
Another member, Suntharee Sengking, said none of the candidates for members and advisers to the sub-panels were experts in health security, but all were nominees of owners of private hospitals or politicians.
