MANILA, Philippines – Finance Secretary Ralph Recto said they will keep an eye on how the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) will be spending its budget in 2025.

“They have adequate resources,” Recto said on Monday, December 30. “We in the Department of Finance next year, tutukan namin ang PhilHealth (will focus on PhilHealth). We will make sure that we spend that budget better.”

The state insurer has P280 billion in reserve funds, P150 billion in surplus, and over P400 billion in investments, the finance chief said.

PhilHealth was marred by controversies in 2024 — particularly on how it allegedly inefficiently spent or rather left most of its finances untouched that its idle funds ballooned. Before its current leadership, PhilHealth benefit packages had not been updated for over a decade.

On Monday, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. finally signed the P6.326-trillion national budget. This is lower than the P6.352 trillion submitted to Congess as Marcos vetoed P194 billion worth of line items that he deemed “inconsistent with the administration’s priority programs.”

However, to the disappointment of advocates and sectoral groups, the state insurer will still not get a single peso in subsidy in 2025.

“President Marcos Jr. is being disingenuous in his veto of a few line items as AKAP [Ayuda sa Kapos ng Kita Program] remains embedded in the national budget. Further, he is being dishonest in saying that PhilHealth benefits will not be affected by lack of subsidy,” Partido Manggagawa secretary general Judy Miranda said in a statement.

Enough to cover services?

Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin said that the Office of the President will ensure that the state insurer will be able to sustain its services.

“Sisiguruhin natin na tuloy-tuloy at mas lalawig pa ang mga benepisyo ng lahat ng Pilipino sa ilalim ng PhilHealth (We will make sure that the benefits Filipinos get under PhilHealth will continue and will also expand),” Marcos said in his speech.

PhilHealth will have a budget in 2025, despite not getting any subsidy from the government. What was cut off was the budget that should have covered for programs, including the premiums of its indirect members — the indigent, senior citizens, and persons with disability. Groups have pointed out that this essentially transfers the state’s responsibility to its paying members.

PhilHealth’s board of directors, which is chaired by Health Secretary Teodoro Herbosa, approved a P284-billion corporate operating budget for 2025. The majority of the budget will be allocated to benefit expenses for members.

Konsulta packages, hemodialysis sessions, emergency care services, outpatient mental health, and other outpatient packages will still be covered. (READ: PhilHealth member benefits to continue despite zero subsidy in 2025)

Herbosa, in a December 17 press conference, said they will continue to improve case rates and packages. The target? Hospital reimbursement rates for members will reach 50% to 70% in 2025.

Meanwhile, Recto vowed to improve the benefit packages for the top 10 illnesses of Filipinos.

Not enough

However, Dr. Tony Leachon, an independent health reform advocate, pointed out that PhilHealth’s P284-billion corporate operating budget for next year would not be enough.

“The cost of top killer diseases of the country in terms of benefit packages is P756 billion and 4.8% of our GDP,” Leachon told Rappler, citing a 2019 report by the World Health Organization.

In a statement on Monday, Leachon said “it is both disheartening and heartbreaking for Filipinos who had placed their hopes in the restoration of PhilHealth’s funds and the reallocation of resources away from discretionary pork barrel funds such as the Congress and Senate AKAP.”

Marcos’ veto, Leachon said, was “nothing more than a symbolic gesture… that does little to address the underlying problems plaguing our national budget.”

“The 2025 General Appropriations Act is a budget that perpetuates inequality and neglects the most vulnerable among us. The line veto of P26 billion in DPWH [Department of Public Works and Highways] projects and P168 billion in Unprogrammed Appropriations — amounting to PhP 194 billion — is a half-hearted attempt at reform,” he said.

“It barely scratches the surface of the P288 billion in congressional insertions, leaving the lion’s share untouched.” – Rappler.com