Health & Wellness Philhealth for an expat?

Are there other alternatives that cost the same or is it just the benefit versus the cost thing?

I have to imagine a private plan is going to be much more expensive. Most people pay more that that a month in the US and have a significant deductibles before they get any coverage. One of the benefits of insurance is pre-negotiated rates that are significantly less. The bill from my wife's appendectomy was almost $70k USD for less than 2 days in the hospital. After negotiated rates, it was something like $10k to the insurance carrier and myself. I have a high deductible plan, so there was still a significant out of pocket, but much less than the $70K without insurance.

 

Charlie, did you get it done at the mall or their office on the highway? Thanks for sharing.

 

It is bewildering that we have to pay that much for partial hospital coverage. The good news/bad news is that if you have a catastrophic medical problem (like a stroke) it pays for itself in a single event. So for me I have to pay for it.
The younger healthier guys here have a harder decision if the don't have home medical coverage.

 

This whole topic is confusing to me. I understand that Philippines would like to have a universal coverage socialized medicine healthcare system, but the government budget is not sufficient to support it. Therefore, they have a hybrid system where part of the expense is contributed by the government, and part by the individual. I can understand why everyone would be happy to have health insurance for 2400p per year! But to me, that seems too good to be true and clearly has shown that their system cannot sustain that. Raising the premium to 17,000p per year is certainly dramatic, I can see how that would be a shock, and it probably should not have been done all at one time. But, it seems to me to be a necessary move to keep the whole system intact as the previous rates were completely unrealistic. Right now, here in the US, I pay the equivalent of 400,000p per year for my health insurance!! When I move to the Philippines if I can get decent coverage for 17,000p per year I will be incredibly happy about that. I still have questions though about just how good that coverage actually is.

 

You won't be in Kansas anymore so direct price comparisons like that are not relevant. Average US income $51,000/yr vs average Philippine income $3,500/yr so it's not even apples to oranges, more like apples to sunflower seeds. Then there is the question of quality.

People are choking on the p17,000/p15,000 per year premium (depending on Visa) for a couple reasons. 1st, the current premium is p2,400/yr for everyone so it is a massive increase. 2nd, the p2,400/yr premium remains the same - except for foreigners. 3rd, the coverage (more of pre-negotiated pricing than insurance coverage) wasn't all that great to start with (but worth it at p2,400) and with increased premiums comes reduced benefits.

 

https://www.philhealth.gov.ph/downloads/pcb/MOP_PCB_Providers.pdf

I completely understand that people are upset by a change like this. I wonder if this isn't a bit of wealth redistribution resulting from free coverage now offered to the poorest people. A bit of taxing the rich expat is you will. In addition, it could be that their model is unsustainable and that a change was necessary. In my experience, great deals don't stay around forever as they are usually unsustainable. This seemed like a pretty good deal.

The piece of cost that I think is important to look at this is the infrastructure needed to support the system as this is the majority of the cost. Yes people (doctors, nurses, hospital works) are cheaper in the Philippines, but that's no where near the majority of the cost. Are MRI machines cheaper there, are buildings cheaper there, are x-ray machines cheaper? How much cheaper are they? I assume that GE charges about the same for an MRI machine regardless of where you buy it. An an example, the physician fees (surgeon, anesthesiologist) for my wife's appendectomy were about $4000 USD. The facility costs were about $65000. I don't think the infrastructure is 15 to 20 times cheaper there, at least not based on my housing experiences.