While Taiwan and Korea both have a public, single-payer healthcare system, the difference is that only Taiwan has implemented a global budget that caps healthcare spending, which has resulted in slower introduction of new drugs and medical technology. The spending cap has also resulted in unreasonably low compensation for health professionals, leading to diminished quality of chronic disease and emergency care. Consequently, in the past 24 years, Taiwan’s average life expectancy has been surpassed by Korea, indicative of a significant gap in the quality of medical care between the two countries.

Representatives from the medical and pharmaceutical industries have called for increasing healthcare investment in Taiwan from the current level of 6.1 percent of the GDP which is far below Japan and Korea. Taiwan College of Healthcare Executives President Hung Tzu-jen said that in addition to raising NHI premiums, a more diversified approach is needed in the future, such as expanding tax revenues channels, increasing the government’s contribution to the NHI budget and allocating funds from the general government budget. Developing new funding sources to enable larger investments in healthcare should be among the priorities of President-elect Lai Ching-te.

As Taiwan expectedly become a super-aged society, Ching-chyuan Hospital Superintendent Lo Yung-ta voiced concerns about the heavier financial burden for the younger generations in the absence of reforms to the NHI system. Former National Health Insurance Administration Director General Lee Po-chang, however, said that calls to reform the NHI are being pulled in two opposing directions, with the medical community urging to lift the cap on the global budget system and public health experts voicing concerns over runaway health spending, leaving little consensus between the two views.

[2024-3-19/CommonWealth Magazine]