The Department of Health (DoH) said it will not implement increases in service charges in public hospitals despite ongoing fuel price volatility.
Health Undersecretary Albert Domingo said on Sunday that fees in all DoH-supervised facilities will remain unchanged in the coming weeks.
“We have DoH hospitals, 82 strong nationwide, including the four GOCC hospitals, that will not increase their prices, even if private hospitals raise their prices based on the President’s orders,” he said in a radio interview Sunday.
Domingo’s statement follows remarks from the Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines Inc. (PHAPI), which said it is considering raising charges due to rising costs of supplies.
PHAPI president Jose Rene de Grano said any increase could reach around five percent.
“Hopefully, the increase will not be that substantial. It will depend on how the hospitals can be resilient and sustain their present situation without increasing their rates,” he said.
Domingo said the DoH has no control over possible increases in private hospitals and is not necessarily opposed to them.
However, he urged private hospitals to unbundle their costs to provide a clearer breakdown of charges.
“What happens nowadays when we get admitted to private hospitals, we have what we call a room rate… prices change and we are charged on a daily basis, but it does not indicate how much goes to electricity, to water, to the salary of health workers, how much goes to the gasoline used for ambulances,” he said.
Domingo said cost unbundling would help the DoH compare expenses with public hospital financing and improve transparency.