President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said his goal for the recently sworn Edwin Mercado as the head and CEO of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) is to prioritize digitalization to upscale their services.
“Kasi maganda naman ang serbisyo ng PhilHealth ngunit ‘yung pag-process ng mga file, ng claim, ng pag-apply, et cetera, ay hindi – kinakamay pa rin. Kaya’t napakabagal, and that’s why that became a priority,” he said.
The president also said that Mercado is “very well-versed in both hospital administration and insurance” and plans to expand PhilHealth’s services.
“In a week’s time, bibigyan kita ng report much more detailed kung ano sa palagay ko ‘yung nakikita ko sa PhilHealth na puwedeng palitan, puwedeng palakihin, et cetera, et cetera,” he said.
Mercado replaced Emmanuel Ledesma, who was told to resign because he found his position “jarring.”
“Well, yes, he left his position already. Sabi niya that nahihirapan na rin yata siya sa ano, with all of the… Hindi siya sanay sa pulitika. Manny Ledesma is very much comes from the private sector. So, I think he found the transition to be jarring, shall we say,” he said.
PhilHealth was under scrutiny for having billions of unused funds. This resulted in Congress giving them zero government subsidies as the corporation can still operate with its national budget allocations and reserved funds.
