The National Health Insurance Committee (NHIC) on Sept. 25 commenced negotiations on the 2025 National Health Insurance (NHI) global budget. However, NHIC Executive Secretary Chou Shu-wan on Sept. 27 said that due to differences between NHIC representatives, two growth rate proposals will be submitted for a final decision by the minister of Health and Welfare in October following confirmation by the NHIC. She said that payers proposed a 4.605% growth rate resulting in a NHI global budget of NT$920.75 billion, while providers proposed a 5.171% growth rate and global budget of NT$925.73 billion.

Executive Secretary Chou said that the Cabinet set the recommended low and high parameters for the 2025 global budget growth rate at 3.521% and 5.5%, so there is only NT$17.4 billion that can be decided via negotiations. She added that global budget negotiations must address the challenge of ensuring efficient use of resources while balancing factors including an aging population, the rising occurrence of chronic diseases and demand to cover more new drugs and medical technologies.

She also specified items where payer and providers representatives have yet to reach consensus, including spending on conditional reimbursement of new drugs, new drugs and medical technology, orphan drug earmarks, compensation for nursing professionals in clinics, and reimbursement standards for diagnostics and treatments. On conditional new drug listing, provider representatives said funding should be drawn from the government budget and therefore no allocations from the NHI global budget should be needed, while payer representatives proposed for NT$600 million to be allocated from the global budget. Regarding new drugs and medical technology, provider representatives called for NT$ 3.6 billion, while payer representative called for NT$ 4.69 billion.

[2024-9-27/ United Daily News]