Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households

This is a nuts and bolts case study of the implementation of the government-financed health coverage program (HCP) for poor households in the Philippines. The data and information in this case study largely draws upon the 2011 World Bank Report 'Transforming the Philippine health sector: challe...

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Main Author:	Chakraborty, Sarbani
Format:	Working Paper
Language:	en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington DC 2013
Subjects:	ACCESS TO QUALITY SERVICES HEALTH COVERAGE PROGRAM MONITORING AND EVALUATION SYSTEMS POOR HOUSEHOLDS UNIVERSAL HEALTH COVERAGE
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/13296

id	okr-10986-13296
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-132962021-04-23T14:03:07Z Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households Chakraborty, Sarbani ACCESS TO QUALITY SERVICES HEALTH COVERAGE PROGRAM MONITORING AND EVALUATION SYSTEMS POOR HOUSEHOLDS UNIVERSAL HEALTH COVERAGE This is a nuts and bolts case study of the implementation of the government-financed health coverage program (HCP) for poor households in the Philippines. The data and information in this case study largely draws upon the 2011 World Bank Report 'Transforming the Philippine health sector: challenges and Future Directions' (Chakraborty et al. 2011), and technical work undertaken for World Bank support to the Government of the Philippines (GOP) for universal health coverage (UHC) in the Philippines.2 The aim of the case study is to understand how the HCP was implemented, what worked and did not work, and how it impacted expected results under the HCP. In 1996, similarly to many low- and middle-income countries, the Philippines introduced a demand-side program for poor households (the Sponsored Program). The objective was to improve access of poor households to needed health services without experiencing a financial burden. Unlike many countries, where such programs are stand alone, in the case of the Philippines it was integrated into the National Health Insurance Program (NHIP). This is a sound design feature from the perspective of providing optimal risk pooling and redistribution, and the Philippines is a model for other countries implementing similar schemes for poor households. The national government has included financing for poor households in the medium-term national expenditure program, so there is no danger of uncertainty in financing. PhilHealth is incrementally strengthening its contract implementation and monitoring mechanisms. The main challenge now facing the HCP is whether these revamped efforts will be able to quickly address the problem of lack of access to quality and affordable services for poor households. There are supply side constraints, facilities will need to be upgraded to obtain Philhealth accreditation. Accredited health facilities will have to be held accountable for delivering services and where public services are not available, mechanisms for incentivizing the private sector for outreach to poor households will have to be deployed. Much depends on Phil Health's capacity as an effective purchaser of health services. Local government unit (LGU) facility capacity to respond to revamped PhilHealth incentives is another bottleneck. The other challenge is whether the Department of Health and PhilHealth will be able to quickly build the monitoring and evaluation systems needed to track HCP implementation and make the necessary in-flight adjustments in implementation in a timely manner. 2013-05-06T15:08:57Z 2013-05-06T15:08:57Z 2013-01 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/13296 en_US UNICO Studies Series;No. 22 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington DC Publications & Research :: Working Paper Publications & Research East Asia and Pacific Philippines
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	en_US
topic	ACCESS TO QUALITY SERVICES HEALTH COVERAGE PROGRAM MONITORING AND EVALUATION SYSTEMS POOR HOUSEHOLDS UNIVERSAL HEALTH COVERAGE
spellingShingle	ACCESS TO QUALITY SERVICES HEALTH COVERAGE PROGRAM MONITORING AND EVALUATION SYSTEMS POOR HOUSEHOLDS UNIVERSAL HEALTH COVERAGE Chakraborty, Sarbani Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households
geographic_facet	East Asia and Pacific Philippines
relation	UNICO Studies Series;No. 22
description	This is a nuts and bolts case study of the implementation of the government-financed health coverage program (HCP) for poor households in the Philippines. The data and information in this case study largely draws upon the 2011 World Bank Report 'Transforming the Philippine health sector: challenges and Future Directions' (Chakraborty et al. 2011), and technical work undertaken for World Bank support to the Government of the Philippines (GOP) for universal health coverage (UHC) in the Philippines.2 The aim of the case study is to understand how the HCP was implemented, what worked and did not work, and how it impacted expected results under the HCP. In 1996, similarly to many low- and middle-income countries, the Philippines introduced a demand-side program for poor households (the Sponsored Program). The objective was to improve access of poor households to needed health services without experiencing a financial burden. Unlike many countries, where such programs are stand alone, in the case of the Philippines it was integrated into the National Health Insurance Program (NHIP). This is a sound design feature from the perspective of providing optimal risk pooling and redistribution, and the Philippines is a model for other countries implementing similar schemes for poor households. The national government has included financing for poor households in the medium-term national expenditure program, so there is no danger of uncertainty in financing. PhilHealth is incrementally strengthening its contract implementation and monitoring mechanisms. The main challenge now facing the HCP is whether these revamped efforts will be able to quickly address the problem of lack of access to quality and affordable services for poor households. There are supply side constraints, facilities will need to be upgraded to obtain Philhealth accreditation. Accredited health facilities will have to be held accountable for delivering services and where public services are not available, mechanisms for incentivizing the private sector for outreach to poor households will have to be deployed. Much depends on Phil Health's capacity as an effective purchaser of health services. Local government unit (LGU) facility capacity to respond to revamped PhilHealth incentives is another bottleneck. The other challenge is whether the Department of Health and PhilHealth will be able to quickly build the monitoring and evaluation systems needed to track HCP implementation and make the necessary in-flight adjustments in implementation in a timely manner.
format	Publications & Research :: Working Paper
author	Chakraborty, Sarbani
author_facet	Chakraborty, Sarbani
author_sort	Chakraborty, Sarbani
title	Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households
title_short	Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households
title_full	Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households
title_fullStr	Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households
title_full_unstemmed	Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households
title_sort	philippines’ government sponsored health coverage program for poor households
publisher	World Bank, Washington DC
publishDate	2013
url	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/13296
_version_	1764423128904105984

Philippines’ Government Sponsored Health Coverage Program for Poor Households

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