With the controversial second-generation National Health Insurance (NHI) program taking effect on Jan. 1, several civic groups yesterday called on the government to ease the burden of the economically disadvantaged by raising the income exemption threshold for supplementary premiums.
Representatives from the National Health Insurance Civic Surveillance Alliance, the Taiwan Labor Front and the League of Welfare Organizations for the Disabled called for raising the threshold to the same level as the minimum monthly wage — NT$18,780 — for the unemployed and housewives.
The demand came after an unexpected decision by the Department of Health on Friday to include postgraduate students in the group defined by the government as “students pursuing studies at junior colleges or undergraduate programs at universities without full-time job,” which are exempted from the supplementary premium if their moonlighting income falls below the statutory basic wage.
Under the second-generation NHI system, a 2 percent supplementary premium is imposed on each NT$5,000 an insured individual earns from six sources — moonlighting, rent, interest, stock dividends, professional practice, as well as job bonuses that are more than four times the individual’s monthly salary.
Under the new rules, people under the age of 18, lower--middle income families, people with disabilities or those who meet certain economic conditions are exempted from the supplementary premium if their part-time income is lower than the minimum monthly wage.
National Health Insurance Civic Surveillance Alliance spokesperson Eva Teng (滕西華) said that faced with pressure from certain interest groups, the Department of Health raised the income threshold subject to the 2 percent supplementary premium “from the originally proposed NT$2,000 to the current NT$5,000 for most individuals; to the same level as the minimum monthly wage of NT$18,780 for postgraduate students; and to NT$20,000 for interest income.”
Teng said the jobless rate remains high at 4.27 percent, with the number of unemployed people reaching 487,000, based on the latest figures released by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics.
However, the NHI system assigns a “virtual” monthly salary of NT$26,000 to jobless people as the basis for calculating their premium. As such, they are obliged to pay a monthly premium of about NT$749, roughly the same amount paid by an insured individual who makes NT$48,000 a month, Teng said.
As many people who are unable to find regular employment have to take up several part-time jobs to make ends meet, they may end up in worse financial straits if they also have to pay a supplementary premium on each NT$5,000 they earn, she said.
“Does the government only go for the easy target? How can the lives of jobless people be any easier than that of postgraduate students?” Teng asked.
Taiwan Labor Front secretary-general Son Yu-lian (孫友聯) said that such an unfair treatment extends to housewives, particularly those who join the NHI through their spouses, as they have to pay a supplementary premium for moonlighting income that is meant to help with family expenses.
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
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
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