PhilHealth defers rate hike; UHC tweaks bill rushed
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HE Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) announced on Tuesday it is temporarily deferring the implementation of its scheduled premium contribution hike following President Duterte’s directive. In a statement, PhilHealth President and Chief Executive Officer Dante A. Gierran said that in the meantime they will still collect premiums from direct contributors using the 3 percent instead of the 3.5 percent contribution rate with a monthly income ceiling of P60,000 instead of P70,000. However, Gierran was quick to point out that the “interim arrangement” will be good until Congress passes a new law allowing the deferment of scheduled premium adjustment in the Universal
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Health Care (UHC) law. “Should there be no new legislation passed for this purpose, the state health insurer will proceed with the scheduled premium rate and ceiling as provided for in the UHC law,” it said. In his weekly public address late Monday, Duterte asked PhilHealth to defer its scheduled premium hike this year, and lawmakers in both chambers of Congress quickly signalled support for remedial legislation to stop the provision of the Universal Health Care (UHC) Law mandating the rate hike.
‘Certify UHC amendment’
HOWEVER, one senator also urged Duterte to certify as urgent the remedial legislation that lawmakers filed in response to calls from vari-
ous groups to halt the premium hike to give reprieve to workers still reeling from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. In a Viber message, Senator Imee Marcos said, “President Duterte must certify the bill” suspending the increase in PhilHealth contributions this year. “Good intentions need to be backed up by an amendment to the law,” Marcos said, after Duterte said payment of higher PhilHealth premiums should be postponed amid the economic and financial difficulties wrought by the Covid-19 pandemic. She asserted that billions of pesos in government loans “can plug revenue losses resulting from the postponement of contributions.” Marcos on Monday filed Sen-
ate Bill 1966 in a bid to postpone to 2022 the legal mandate of PhilHealth to raise membership contributions by 0.5 percent this year to 3.5 percent. “Under the UHC act, the same incremental 0.5-percent increase will be applied each year until 2025 when PhilHealth contributions will reach 5 percent of members’ salaries,” she noted, even as the senator suggested that “passing the bill to suspend the increase will also solve the dilemma of PhilHealth officials who were duty-bound to implement the law but must also heed the call of the times.” She warned that PhilHealth officials “may be accused of dereliction of duty if they do not carry out their mandate under the existing UHC Law.” Continued on A2
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AS INFLATION HITS 3.5% PEAKING PRICES HIT PINOYS’ PURCHASING POWER IN DEC 2020 By Cai U. Ordinario
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Continued on A2 QUEZON City government with MMDA and MRT 7 contractor EEI started implementing a zipper lane from 6 am to 11 am to ease the traffic congestion along Commonwealth Avenue caused by the MRT-7 construction at the Quezon City Memorial Circle Elliptical Road-North Avenue interchange, which is being extended for another two months until February 27, 2021. NONOY LACZA
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By Bianca Cuaresma
HE faster rise of consumer prices in the last month of the year may put the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (BSP) easing measures on hold, at least in the early parts of 2021. After the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) announcement on Tuesday that inflation hit a 22-month high level of 3.5 percent in December, BSP Governor Benjamin Diokno told reporters that
this level of acceleration is well within their expectations for monetary policy. “The December 2020 inflation of 3.5 percent was within the BSP’s forecast range of 2.9 to 3.7
PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 48.0220
percent.… The BSP continues to expect inflation to settle within the target range over the policy horizon,” Diokno said. The governor also said the recent uptrend in inflation is largely “transitory,” reflecting the shortterm impact of weather disturbances. The Philippines’s inflation numbers have been consistently rising toward the latter part of 2020. From 2.3 percent in September, it accelerated to 2.5 percent in October, 3.3 percent in November and up to 3.5 percent in December. This rise in the country’s inflation will likely push the BSP to
pause its easing measures despite earlier pronouncements that they will keep the country’s monetary policy accommodative to curb economic disruptions wrought by the measures used to curtail the spread of the pandemic.
No rate cuts soon
IN an assessment, ING Bank Manila economist Nicholas Mapa said with the recent inflation reading, the BSP is not likely to cut policy rates anytime soon. “With the central bank pushing up its 2021 inflation forecast to 3.2 percent, we do not expect
HE successive typhoons that struck the Philippines in the fourth quarter and the holidays increased the prices of goods and services in December 2020 and further weakened the purchasing power of Filipinos, Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) data showed. On Tuesday, PSA reported that inflation rate accelerated to 3.5 percent, coming from 3.3 percent in November 2020 and 2.5 percent in December 2019. Full-year inflation was pegged at 2.6 percent, within government targets. However, the December data brought aggregate inflation from 2012 to 2020 to an aggregate of 26.2 percent, according to the computation of the PSA. “The quantity of goods and services worth P100 in 2012 is worth P126.20 in December 2020. The growth rate is 26.2 percent,” National Statistician Claire Dennis S. Mapa told the BusinessMirror. Weaker purchasing power for a consumption-driven economy like the Philippines means slower growth. But for households already struggling with low incomes, De La Salle University’s Maria Ella Oplas said, that could mean hunger. Oplas said the natural reaction of households to low incomes and high prices is to remove miscellaneous expenses such as the schooling of children or allowing a child to start earning his or her keep. Unionbank Chief Economist Ruben Carlo S. Asuncion told the BusinessMirror that crises would usually showcase the resilience of Filipinos. Households will always find ways to survive. Asuncion said, however, that this should not be used as an excuse to provide poor public services. The resilience of Filipino families should instead be “compensated” with excellent public service. But if all the possible miscellaneous expenses were removed, workarounds have been exhausted, and incomes were still not enough to buy basic needs, Oplas said reducing food consumption would be possible. “I think our opponent now is hunger because of the long recession. This is a bigger problem for Filipinos. This is why you see people willing to take the risk of getting Covid-19 just to earn and feed their family,” Oplas said. Continued on A4
Continued on A2
n JAPAN 0.4658 n UK 65.1851 n HK 6.1937 n CHINA 7.4315 n SINGAPORE 36.3693 n AUSTRALIA 36.7993 n EU 58.8366 n SAUDI ARABIA 12.8014
Source: BSP (January 5, 2021)