For perspective, the PGH received P6.87 billion ($134.90 Billion) in 2021. Thus, instead of increasing the hospital’s budget because of the increasing expenses due to the demands of the pandemic, the proposed budget cuts the hospital’s allocation by 18 percent.
The worst illnesses of our country are the ones that make us believe that social change is impossible, and that the suffering of millions of Filipinos is inescapable. The worst living conditions is where med students and health workers believe that they have no role in campaigning and fighting for just and lasting peace.
“The problem with the current policy is that we are operating under the premise of very little budget, that’s why there’s a shortage of COVID-19 test kits. And people would have to pay for it first.”
At the Philippine General Hospital, patients have been increasing but employees have been decreasing, thereby affecting service delivery.
“Even now that we are contractuals we suffer hardships because our salaries are meager. What more if we lose our jobs.”
“The patients are increasing but the manpower is not. With this kind of set up, health workers, who are mostly overworked, are vulnerable to mistakes.”
By MARYA SALAMAT
The crisis at the Philippine General Hospital worsened last week as 75 of the hospital’s topnotch and highly qualified doctors and medical professors went on mass leave starting March 29 to express “anger and dismay over the oppression and dubious removal from office” of the hospital’s director, Dr. Jose Gonzales. They said, however, that they would still respond to emergency or life-threatening cases.
By MARYA SALAMAT
The Philippine General Hospital — the country’s hospital of last resort especially for indigent patients, a key training ground for students of the University of the Philippines, and the premier public hospital in the country — is currently embroiled in a mess over who should be its rightful director. It’s an imbroglio that has its roots to a multi-million peso lease contract.
The management of the country’s premier public hospital said that there is a need to increase fees to have funds for improving facilities and services. Various groups, however, argued that increasing fees will be done at the expense of the poor who are supposed to be the main beneficiaries of public health services. BY AUBREY…