Health, health care and health insurance

THIS is the tagline of a famous brand of multivitamins, and indeed, it is costly to get sick nowadays.

Health care has been included in the list of the basic needs. The basic needs used to include food, shelter and clothing, however, in most recent UN conventions, education and health were included in the list. Even as healthcare is a basic need, the government cannot provide this merit good (a good that can bring positive effects to the consumer) on their own.

So, the private sector fills in the gap by constructing hospitals and private clinics. However, these private hospitals are so expensi ve.

Healthcare may be classified as relatively inelastic good, which means that the consumers are not very responsive to changes in price that is in the short-run. However, as healthcare becomes more expensive, changes in the consumption pattern can be observed as time goes by.

If healthcare is a basic

“Mahal magkasakit!”

need, so why is it so expensive to be healthy or to gain back health?

From the initial visit to the doctor, to the diagnosis of and prognosis for the disease to the treatment or management of the illness, one really has to spend a sizeable sum of money. Furthermore, one has to pay over and above those mentioned earlier, professional fees of doctors and other health care professionals like radiologists, medical technologists, pharmacists, etc. need to be paid, too, and their fees are not exactly cheap.

I witness this on a daily basis. My mother is sick with what is called pulmonary embolism, a rare yet very fatal disease. We are lucky that it was detected early, and is now being treated with medicines. The medicines are very expensive though. Good thing, she gets her monthly pension from SSS. Although it is meager, it helps a lot especially with the costly medicines.

She was hospitalized several times for the past few years. Hospital bills amounted to tens of thousands of Pesos. That is why so many people are afraid to go to hospitals because they may end up broke for paying high hospital bills.

However, the amount deducted representing the PhilHealth coverage from the hospital bill are not to be neglected. They are substantial actually, and they really help ease the burden of the exorbitant hospital bill.

PhilHealth has implemented programs for the senior citizens and for the indigents. This is one way for citizens to avoid unnecessary deaths particularly the poor patients. In the past, they choose not to be brought to the hospitals because they have no money to pay the hospital bills. Now, with the inclusion of the Senior Citizens and the indigents being covered by PhilHealth, they now have better access to basic medical services, without thinking of the costs anym or e.

This provision of government health insurance coverage is done because of what is called a Positive Externality of Production. Externalities are effects to third parties not part of the transaction. So when there is a positive externality, it is believed that third parties (or society as a whole) benefit from the production or provision of the health insurance.

This is one proof that the government is doing its best to address the health problem of the country, especially the marginalized sectors like the elderly and the poor. However, it is not enough. Having another private health insurance is advisable nowadays. Then again, it is again expensive.

With the world getting more and more polluted, the chances of one getting sick is getting higher and higher as well. As much as we do not like to get sick, we can contract any sickness from any source, even if we gulped a thousand of that multivitamins.

What can we do then?

Pray. It’s the best defense.— JP Villanueva