The opposition Kuomintang caucus on March 8 held a news conference on the government’s plans to raise copayments and urged the Ministry of Health and Welfare to improve the way resources are used and allocated, while also sounding concerns that the change will impede access to healthcare.

In response, the National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) published a news statement saying that the copayment adjustments are not meant to shore up National Health Insurance’s (NHI) finances, but to encourage the public to modify their healthcare seeking habits through small increases to copayments. The NHIA said that the copayment changes will not apply to people with catastrophic illnesses, mothers giving birth, residents of Taiwan’s remote areas and outlying islands, as well as economic disadvantaged, people with disabilities, children under the age of three, and veterans and their family members.

The NHIA said that the implementation of the global budget system for the NHI in 2002 was motivated by the need to rein in the system’s ever-growing expenditures. As a result, the annual growth rate of NHI expenditures have been contained at around 5 percent between 2003 and 2024. Besides, the government has continued to contribute to NHI finances, including higher-than-expected collection of supplemental premiums in 2022, an injection of NT$24 billion in funding from the government budget in 2023, as well as a special bill allocating NT$20 billion in surplus tax revenues, also in 2023. Boosted by the provision of the aforementioned funding, it is estimated that the NHI safety reserve can be kept at above the legally mandated threshold equivalent to one month’s expenditure, thereby removing the need to increase raise NHI premiums rates before the end of 2024, leading a lower financial burden for the public.

[2023-3-8/Commercial Times]