Opposition lawmakers today will petition the Control Yuan to impeach Twu Shiing-jer (涂醒哲), head of the Department of Health, and Chang Hong-jen (張鴻仁), general manager of the Bureau of National Health Insurance, to take responsibility for what they said was poor management and supervision of the seven-year-old, debt-ridden National Health Insurance program.
In an apparent attempt to ease the tension between the executive and legislative branches, Twu yesterday made no further comments on the matter.
He had pledged to forge ahead with the new fee scheme despite a legislative resolution to suspend it.
The Legislative Yuan on Friday approved the government's budget for this year but attached a resolution demanding an immediate stop to the four-month old increase in National Health Insurance premiums and co-payment rates.
The health department introduced the current fee scheme last September, saying it could not keep the health insurance program afloat otherwise.
Opposition legislators, however, argued that the government should seek first to crack down on inefficiencies in the health system.
Independent Legislator Sisy Chen (
"Instead of figuring out a way to curb rampant medical costs to save the health insurance program from bankruptcy, the two agencies came up with the wrongful policy of increasing the monthly premium and co-payment fees," Chen said.
Claiming losses of between NT$1.5 billion and NT$2 billion a month, the two agencies launched a new fee system on Sept. 1 last year, the day Twu became acting head of the health department, to raise the premium rate from 4.25 to 4.55 percent of salaries in addition to raising the fees paid by patients at medical facilities.
While the government should take care of the medical needs of the underprivileged, Chen said, the government instead asks those who cannot afford the insurance fees to pay more on their outstanding insurance fees and keeps their insurance cards to bar them from seeking medical help until they pay off the default.
The two agencies should also be held accountable for the recent medical blunders in Taipei and Pingtung counties, she said.
In the foul-ups, patients were given vaccines or drugs incorrectly, apparently because they failed to understand English labeling.
In addition to the impeachment, Chen said she would continue to push for amending the Health Insurance Law to let the legislature have the final say on the hike in insurance fees.
Regulations stipulate that legislative consent is not necessary as long as the insurance premium does not exceed 6 percent of subscribers' monthly incomes.
Chen also lambasted the year-end bonus health insurance bureau staff are getting this year.
"It's outrageous that while some people cannot afford the insurance fees, bureau staff are getting a year-end bonus," she said.
In response, Twu said that he has already requested the bureau review the bonus system, and is considering excluding the revenues generated from the new fee scheme from its annual revenues.
"There'll be a fairer bonus system as soon as the legislative body rules that the bureau is a government agency rather than a profit-making entity," he said.
Also see story:
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater