The Department of Health (DOH) yesterday defended its second-generation health plan, saying the new plan would benefit households with more financial dependents such as spouses or children.
DOH officials yesterday continued to answer legislators’ questions about the proposed amendments to the National Health Insurance Act (全民健康保險法) at the legislature’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee meeting.
The department has recently come under fire from the Consumers’ Foundation and other civic groups, which have said that the second-generation health plan would create a heavier burden for ordinary single or double-income households, while letting the wealthy pay relatively little.
Son Yu-lian (孫友聯), convener of the National Health Insurance Civic Surveillance Alliance, said that a majority of families have few children and because they have few dependents, these small families would still bear the brunt of rising insurance premiums.
Son said that a public hearing was necessary to discuss issues such as which types of income are included in the calculation of premiums charged per household.
Department of Health Minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良) defended the health plan by saying that the premium rate would most likely not exceed 2.7 percent, and that the public would not see their premiums soar to high levels as some critics have suggested.
Chu Tong-kuang (曲同光), a deputy convener of a DOH task force on insurance premiums, said that the second-generation plan would be more beneficial to households with more dependents, because each additional dependent would be charged a diminishing premium, while households with fewer dependents and more income sources may have to shoulder a heavier share of the burden.
DOH officials confirmed that certain households, such as a single person earning a single income with no dependents, would have to pay more under the new plan.
However, a dual-income family with dependents such as parents and children would pay less than under the current plan, they said.
Twenty-four Republican members of the US House of Representatives yesterday introduced a concurrent resolution calling on the US government to abolish the “one China” policy and restore formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Led by US representatives Tom Tiffany and Scott Perry, the resolution calls for not only re-establishing formal relations, but also urges the US Trade Representative to negotiate a free-trade agreement (FTA) with Taiwan and for US officials to advocate for Taiwan’s full membership in the UN and other international organizations. In a news release announcing the resolution, Tiffany, who represents a Wisconsin district, called the “one China” policy “outdated, counterproductive
Actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) has “returned home” to Taiwan, and there are no plans to hold a funeral for the TV star who died in Japan from influenza- induced pneumonia, her family said in a statement Wednesday night. The statement was released after local media outlets reported that Barbie Hsu’s ashes were brought back Taiwan on board a private jet, which arrived at Taipei Songshan Airport around 3 p.m. on Wednesday. To the reporters waiting at the airport, the statement issued by the family read “[we] appreciate friends working in the media for waiting in the cold weather.” “She has safely returned home.
ON PAROLE: The 73-year-old suspect has a criminal record of rape committed when he was serving in the military, as well as robbery and theft, police said The Kaohsiung District Court yesterday approved the detention of a 73-year-old man for allegedly murdering three women. The suspect, surnamed Chang (張), was arrested on Wednesday evening in connection with the death of a 71-year-old woman surnamed Chao (趙). The Kaohsiung City Police Department yesterday also unveiled the identities of two other possible victims in the serial killing case, a 75-year-old woman surnamed Huang (黃), the suspect’s sister-in-law, and a 75-year-old woman surnamed Chang (張), who is not related to the suspect. The case came to light when Chao disappeared after taking the suspect back to his residence on Sunday. Police, upon reviewing CCTV
Johanne Liou (劉喬安), a Taiwanese woman who shot to unwanted fame during the Sunflower movement protests in 2014, was arrested in Boston last month amid US President Donald Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigrants, the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) said yesterday. The arrest of Liou was first made public on the official Web site of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Tuesday. ICE said Liou was apprehended for overstaying her visa. The Boston Field Office’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) had arrested Liou, a “fugitive, criminal alien wanted for embezzlement, fraud and drug crimes in Taiwan,” ICE said. Liou was taken into custody