A Bureau of National Health Insurance (BNHI) official yesterday denied claims the bureau was planning to impose major constraints on payments for new drugs in an attempt to reduce costs.
Huang Chao-ming (
Huang made the denial in response to a claim by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lin Teh-fu (
Lin held a news conference yesterday to make public the minutes of a recent bureau meeting at the bureau. Huang was quoted as saying in the meeting that "until the National Health Insurance balance sheet has been improved, the bureau will not pay for any new drugs, except for medications for cancers and rare diseases."
Chang recently said he would support a draft bill encouraging the development of the biotechnology industry and new bio-medications -- a bill promoted by Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) -- was passed into law as soon as possible.
Several days ago, Academia Sinica researcher Hsieh Chee-ruey (
Hsieh was quoted as saying on July 5 his own and foreign research results proved that new drugs help prolong people's lives and consequently help raise a country's productivity.
Hsieh said restricting payments for new drugs would drag Taiwan's overall productivity down in the long run while contributing little to improving the national health insurance program's finances.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
A Taiwanese woman on Sunday was injured by a small piece of masonry that fell from the dome of St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican during a visit to the church. The tourist, identified as Hsu Yun-chen (許芸禎), was struck on the forehead while she and her tour group were near Michelangelo’s sculpture Pieta. Hsu was rushed to a hospital, the group’s guide to the church, Fu Jing, said yesterday. Hsu was found not to have serious injuries and was able to continue her tour as scheduled, Fu added. Mathew Lee (李世明), Taiwan’s recently retired ambassador to the Holy See, said he met
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
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