Proposal to merge commune and ward health stations

Ms. Nguyen Thi Lan - Deputy Head of the Culture - Social Committee of the Provincial People's Council chaired the meeting. Photo: Mai Hoa

According to the report from the Town People's Committee, in recent times, the locality has focused on implementing policies and laws on health insurance, creating some changes in this field. Notably, the propaganda and mobilization work has increased the rate of people participating in health insurance from 71% (in 2015) to 81.95% (in 2018).

At the meeting, members of the monitoring delegation raised concerns about the health insurance participation rate in the area being lower than the average of the whole province (the whole province reached 86.93%).

The number of enterprises and individual business households that have not participated in paying health insurance for their employees is still high, with more than 100 enterprises and nearly 1,000 individual business households not participating in health insurance for their employees. In addition, the rate of household cards is low, only reaching over 64%.

Vice Chairman of the Town People's Committee Dinh Van Thi proposed merging commune and ward health stations to avoid waste of facilities and increase human resources for health stations. Photo: Mai Hoa

Responding to concerns of the members of the monitoring team, Mr. Dinh Van Thi - Vice Chairman of the Town People's Committee shared that currently the rate of poor and near-poor households in the town is low, with 2.16% of poor households, 2.77% of near-poor households; meaning that the beneficiaries of the State policy of 100% support and 90% of health insurance contribution are few.

Meanwhile, the remaining households have an average standard of living, with income not much different from near-poor households, so the mobilization process is difficult, leading to a low rate of health insurance participation in the area.

The Vice Chairman of the Town People's Committee also shared that the businesses operating in the area are mainly small, medium and micro; including individual businesses with seasonal production and business; many businesses owe their employees' salaries, at least for 1 quarter, at most for nearly 1 year. This is the reason for the difficulty in propaganda and mobilization work for this group to buy health insurance for employees.

Laparoscopic surgery at Nghe An Northwest Regional General Hospital. Photo: Mai Hoa

Giving another reason for the low rate of people participating in health insurance, Vice Chairman of the Town People's Committee Dinh Van Thi also pointed out the current situation, the quality of medical examination and treatment at the commune and ward levels is still low, although in the town, 10/10 commune-level health stations meet the National standard level 2, and the facilities are quite well invested. However, the capacity and qualifications of the staff are limited, the medical equipment is poor, and it has not created trust and become a reliable address for the people.

Based on the reality, the Vice Chairman of the Town People's Committee proposed to study the plan to merge medical stations, about 2-3 medical stations into one station, both to avoid wasting facilities and to increase human resources to perform well the initial medical examination and treatment tasks in the area.

Deputy Head of the Culture - Social Committee of the Provincial People's Council Nguyen Thi Lan concluded at the meeting. Photo: Mai Hoa

Concluding the meeting, Deputy Head of the Department of Culture and Society Nguyen Thi Lan acknowledged the attention in the leadership and direction of the implementation of health insurance policies and laws of the town and the initial coordination between sectors to expand the subjects and increase the rate of people participating in health insurance every year.

Pointing out some shortcomings and limitations in this work, Head of the monitoring delegation Nguyen Thi Lan suggested that the town continue to strengthen its direction and have specific solutions to achieve the province's common goal of having 90% of the population participating in health insurance by 2020. The town also needs to pay attention to coordinating with sectors and organizations to develop programs and sign cooperation commitments in propagating and mobilizing subjects to participate in health insurance.

The town needs to focus on improving the medical staff in general and those working in the health insurance sector in particular, ensuring better implementation of the State management function in this sector.