30-Baht Universal Healthcare Programme To Start Next Month: Thailand

[webfact]

30-baht universal healthcare programme to start next month

The Nation

BANGKOK: -- Patients using the new Bt30 universal healthcare programme will be allowed to change hospitals four times a year once the revived programme gets underway on September 1, the public health minister said on Monday.

Witthaya Buranasiri said the Bt30-per-visit universal healthcare programme will begin nationwide on September 1 with the participation of community hospitals, general hospitals, regional-centre hospitals and some private hospitals.

Under the revived programme, patients will be able to use their ID cards to request a change of hospitals to one nearer their homes four times a year, compared to the twice a year earlier permitted.

The Bt30 universal healthcare programme was initiated by the Thai Rak Thai government. When the Democrats became the leader of the coalition, they modified the project and turned it into a totally free universal healthcare service.

Pheu Thai decided to revive the Bt30 per visit healthcare programme on the grounds that it would reduce some of the budget burden on the government and hospitals involved. However, some observers say that Pheu Thai simply wanted to revive the signature of its populist scheme that helped it win the elections.

Witthaya said patients would be required to pay Bt30 in the event they required medications. However, 21 groups of people would be exempted from the Bt30 payment. These groups include low-income people, local administration officials, people who are older than 60, the handicapped, Buddhist monks, nuns and novices, and Islamic religious leaders, as well children under 12 years.

-- The Nation 2012-08-13

[Greer]

That should help their popularity - start charging for something that the previous government made free...

[animatic]

That should help their popularity - start charging for something that the previous government made free...

That really is the point.

It took them a year to reinstall 'a way to CHARGE for, wow, FOUR hospitals,

FOR A FORMERLY FREE SERVICE from ANY HOSPITAL IN THE LAND.

What they call progress boggles the mind.

Edited August 13, 2012 by animatic

[endure]

That should help their popularity - start charging for something that the previous government made free...

That really is the point.

It took them a year to reinstall 'a way to CHARGE for, wow, FOUR hospitals,

FOR A FORMERLY FREE SERVICE from ANY HOSPITAL IN THE LAND.

What they call progress boggles the mind.

Thais will be allowed to change the hospital they are registered at 4 times a year. Under the previous plan they were only allowed to change once a year.

[ThaidDown]

The collection of the 30 baht payments will require an increase in the paperwork, bureaucracy and possibly staff. Money has to be collected and banked, receipts given exemptions noted.

The big question is... How much will it actually cost to collect each 30 baht?? (will it even be worked out)

Edit .. none

Edited August 13, 2012 by ThaidDown

[Mosha]

The collection of the 30 baht payments will require an increase in the paperwork, bureaucracy and possibly staff. Money has to be collected and banked, receipts given exemptions noted.

The big question is... How much will it actually cost to collect each 30 baht?? (will it even be worked out)

IIRC It cost 80 Baht to collect when the Dems scrapped it.

[animatic]

The collection of the 30 baht payments will require an increase in the paperwork, bureaucracy and possibly staff. Money has to be collected and banked, receipts given exemptions noted.

The big question is... How much will it actually cost to collect each 30 baht?? (will it even be worked out)

Edit .. none

The reason the charge was removed before was because

it cost more to process the 30 baht than the 30 baht taken in.

[kennedy]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

[thaicbr]

That should help their popularity - start charging for something that the previous government made free...

That really is the point.

It took them a year to reinstall 'a way to CHARGE for, wow, FOUR hospitals,

FOR A FORMERLY FREE SERVICE from ANY HOSPITAL IN THE LAND.

What they call progress boggles the mind.

Thais will be allowed to change the hospital they are registered at 4 times a year. Under the previous plan they were only allowed to change once a year.

Wrong. Twice a year.

sent from my Wellcom A90+

[Tafia]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

It makes sense especially if you are registered as long term with Immigration, house owner or long term renter, would certainly boost the pot!!

[Thaddeus]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

It makes sense especially if you are registered as long term with Immigration, house owner or long term renter, would certainly boost the pot!!

You already can, and have been able to do for a long time now.

[Tafia]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

It makes sense especially if you are registered as long term with Immigration, house owner or long term renter, would certainly boost the pot!!

You already can, and have been able to do for a long time now.

Please tell us how. My wife enquired and was told a definite No.

[khunken]

I know that it may be an unpopular view, but isn't the B30 fee designed to prevent abuse of the system rather than making it in any way profitable. By abuse I mean visiting the hospital for a runny nose or the like.

[toenail]

The "30 baht card" sounds great, but if I remember a few years back, hospitals were left with huge debts to pay...govenment did not reimburse. --But again, another ploy to get votes from the Red supporters. Too bad all the money spent on government socialistic projects (health card; auto discount; i-Pads...) don't go towards improving education. Wait, we don't want the supporters of Thaksin to become wise and be able to think for themselves!!!11

[PoorSucker]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

It makes sense especially if you are registered as long term with Immigration, house owner or long term renter, would certainly boost the pot!!

You already can, and have been able to do for a long time now.

Please tell us how. My wife enquired and was told a definite No.

If you have a work permit as employee, apparently my title as manager dis not qualify me.

[notime]

Health care should be affordable, not free. It is not free to train and pay doctors, to run hospitals and the administration required. Free healthcare is not respected, create huge waste and decline in the quality of services. 30 THB per visit looks like free to me because one cannot even have a 10 minute hair-cut for 30 THB. 30 THB would probably be more costly just to collect. This makes no sense. Even if someone is on 5,000 THB per month should still be able to afford 100 THB to see a doctor. This "healthcare programme" looks to me like a political stunt only.

[yourauntbob]

This whole free health care thing is a sham. Most Thai's I know sign forms waving their right to it so they can pay for proper treatment. If you give away free crap, its still crap.

[oldgeezer]

In the interest of clarification on eligiblility for 30 baht insurance:

I have been here on retirement extension continually for seven years, renting homes all that time.

Married to a Thai lady for 30 years.

Eligible or not?

[talatnat]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

It makes sense especially if you are registered as long term with Immigration, house owner or long term renter, would certainly boost the pot!!

You already can, and have been able to do for a long time now.

Please tell us how. My wife enquired and was told a definite No.

As a foreigner, I have a "Yellow Tabian Baan" House Registration, in which only I am registered. My Thai wife and kids are listed in the standard "Blue Tabian Baan". My wife took my Yellow book to the local government hospital and they agreed that it entitles me to the Thailand's Universal Health Scheme (?), and gave me a computer-generated printout saying the same. No card, and all free, since the previous government had scrapped the 30-baht scheme when we applied. Luckily, I have not gotten to use it yet, and have been ambivalent about it's validity since it seems to be too good to be true. If you "search", you'll find references that The Yellow Book entitles you to healthcare, but I couldn't find info on how to do it. We went to the same office at the local government hospital that required that we register my kids for free or 30-baht care when they were born there.

[jsflynn603]

Why not let farangs that live here year round buy into the system?I would be more than willing to pay a discounted amount as opposed to getting shafted by the insurance companies.Hell, I can't even use medicare unless I jump on a plane and go back to the states where it 60% more expensive+ airfare.That would pump alot more money into the system.

P.S. Sorry, I think I just had a wild dream

Uh, I think that you're missing the forest for the trees...

I can buy my Astra-Zeneca lipid med called Crestor from Singapore for less than half of what my insurance co-pay is here in America.

The BigPharm/Medica business does not want anyone outside the system. Even if you're in Medicare/Medicaid consider that someone gets the "Oh So Discounted" ability to charge half of what Crestor costs at a pharmacy. So if on Medicare, your prescription "costs" (the countly) half of the $150, so let's say $75...now consider, that I can buy the same med, in the same packaging made by the same manufacturer (there is no generic that I know of for rosuvastatin (crestor)) that someone, somewhere (the med/big pharm) is reaping a huge profit. Huge because if I can buy the same med for $35 shipped from Singapore then Astr-Zenica must make a profit at lest than a $35/month sale... so on a discounted Medicare schedule of a palty $75 payment... get the idea.

If you are in America, using Medicare--you rack up a huge bill, but you do not see it, but you will, eventually when the whole system collapses (what...2 years....5? but it will) because that huge bill is being paid--to the Pharma/Medica industry with what.... the answer: DEBT, and who owes this debt....

The answer...the people. For you luckily, at the moment, you are sort of exempt, but when the piper must be paid, you will pay... How, you might ask. The answer: when the US$ drops to 20 baht/$, and what will your pension/social security monthly check buy then?

So this is why expats cannot use the much, much cheaper foreign hospitals, though much cheaper...there is no profit to be made this way.

Strange but true...

[MiguelDelgado]

Showed my yellow tabien baan at my local hospital and they said that for a yearly fee of 1300 Baht I can enroll in the gold card system which entitles me to free health care but only at my local hospital.

[animatic]

That should help their popularity - start charging for something that the previous government made free...

That really is the point.

It took them a year to reinstall 'a way to CHARGE for, wow, FOUR hospitals,

FOR A FORMERLY FREE SERVICE from ANY HOSPITAL IN THE LAND.

What they call progress boggles the mind.

Thais will be allowed to change the hospital they are registered at 4 times a year. Under the previous plan they were only allowed to change once a year.

Wrong. Twice a year.

sent from my Wellcom A90+

As was stated in the OP.

Basically that means:

Where they work when not raising rice or harvesting

and back home where they raise rice and harvest.

It still costs 30 baht more for national health service hospitals

than it did before PTP did their magic accounting work.

[hellodolly]

Health care should be affordable, not free. It is not free to train and pay doctors, to run hospitals and the administration required. Free healthcare is not respected, create huge waste and decline in the quality of services. 30 THB per visit looks like free to me because one cannot even have a 10 minute hair-cut for 30 THB. 30 THB would probably be more costly just to collect. This makes no sense. Even if someone is on 5,000 THB per month should still be able to afford 100 THB to see a doctor. This "healthcare programme" looks to me like a political stunt only.

And you thought the PT could do any thing else. Edited August 13, 2012 by hellodolly

[rubl]

Unfortunately too late for the list of first year achievements of PM Yingluck's government.

I wonder how much a 0 to 30 Baht increase works out in the calculation of the monthly inflation rate ?

[Bpraim1]

I am part of the Thai 30 baht system. Have been for 2 yrs now.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Thaivisa Connect App

[Bpraim1]

I paid nothing to join. I HOPE the 30baht will slow down all the people that go just to get free drugs,

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Thaivisa Connect App

[rubl]

The "30-Baht Healthcare" scheme was made free by the Junta installed PM Surayut government late 2006 or begin 2007.

So for the last five or more year NO-ONE was part of a 30-Baht healthcare scheme, at least not in Thailand.

[Reasonableman]

I paid nothing to join. I HOPE the 30baht will slow down all the people that go just to get free drugs,

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Thaivisa Connect App

Very doubtful. The ones who would be affected, who might be influenced not to overuse health services because of the 30 Baht cost are largely exempt. Doctors are responsible for prescribing drugs, not patients, so they must take due responsibility for overprescribing and the associated costs.

[indyuk]

The relevance of the 30 Baht is the creation of an audit trail to improve security of service and reduce time wasting attendances. No Thai that is unable to pay will be refused service.Therefore Any Thai with a valid ID card can establish continuity of treatment for themselves at up to four hospitals (eg. Migrant workers) per year.

.

[SuneeTH]

Why pay 30 baht when all the govt hospital in Thailand are FREE?