Free health care for patients : Health Minister
Just one day after making headlines by vowing to ban all forms of advertising for alcoholic drinks, new Public Health Minister Dr Mongkol Na Songkhla was under the media spotlight again Thursday when he said the Bt30 health care scheme must be renamed.
"The 'Bt30 cures-all-diseases' [slogan] was used by the Thai Rak Thai Party as a marketing gimmick," said Mongkol."Well, just because I don't want to use this logo of the past government does not mean I don't agree with them. The point is, I don't want the patient to be charged Bt30 [per hospital visit] any more." The doctor saw no good reason to charge a patient a Bt30 service charge as the money was almost nothing to the hospitals joining the scheme, he said. "They collect the Bt30 and have to write it down in three accounts while other patients wait in a long line," he said. "It's not worth it. Let them save time to treat more patients." Mongkol noted that some small healthcare units collected only Bt120 or Bt150 a day, yet had to spend a great deal of time doing the accounts. The doctor said he was going to discuss the matter with the National Health Security Office, which oversees the Bt30 health care scheme. As to when the scheme will stop charging patients' Bt30 per hospital visit, Mongkol said: "Very soon." Moreover, he said, in the future the ministry might also cancel the use of the "gold card", the identification card of patients registered under the Bt30 health care scheme. The Nation
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