Council seeks rise in clinic fees

Council seeks rise in clinic fees

JAKARTA (JP): Speaker of the City Council, M.H. Ritonga, urged yesterday for people not to object to a plan to raise health service fees at Puskesmas (community health centers) throughout the city.

Ritonga said it is important to review the plan objectively and conduct comprehensive research on the plan.

"The plan seems unfair if we view the percentage of the rise only, but if we review it carefully we will see that the fees are still much cheaper than those in public hospitals," Ritonga told reporters.

He explained this means city administration is still subsidizing all community health centers.

Ritonga said it is necessary to increase the fees because the current fee was set in 1985.

"The current fee was set 10 years ago and it is about time to increase it because, ideally, it should have been increased every year," Ritonga said, adding that it is impossible to change a Provincial Decree every year.

The city council is still reviewing the proposal to change the decree.

The City Health Office announced on Wednesday it has proposed to city administration that the fee for health services at Puskesmas be raised from Rp 300 to Rp 900, 300 percent, per patient.

The office said the proposed increase was made because of price rises in medical equipment and other facilities.

Many people have objected to the plan, saying that most of people who visited Puskesmas are poor people who cannot otherwise afford to see a doctor and many of them cannot even afford to pay the current fee.

Ritonga also said it is not necessary to argue that the rise will put poor people at a disadvantage because the government has already set up a system for the poor to get free medical assistance.

"The government has set up a health card program, in which poor people will get free medical treatment if they have health cards issued by subdistrict offices," he said.

Ritonga supported a proposal, raised by the Indonesian Consumers Protection Foundation, to finance Puskesmas from compensation paid by 40 private hospitals in the city, that have not yet fulfilled the requirement.

"That's a very good proposal. But besides that I urged the city administration to take firm action against private hospitals that failed to obey the regulation," Ritonga said.

However, Ritonga added, the city council should discuss the plan with the community before approving the city administration's proposal to change the provincial decree on health service fees at Puskesmas. (yns)