PhilHealth has paid P800 million out of P1.1 billion debt — Gordon
MANILA, Philippines — The country's state insurer has settled some P800 million out of its P1.1 billion debt to the Philippine Red Cross, the organization's chairman Sen. Richard Gordon said Wednesday.
Red Cross was forced to halt its coronavirus tests funded by the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. last month as a result of the agency's failure to settle its overdue amounts.
At a media forum, Gordon said the embattled agency that has figured in corruption allegations over the past months have so far made three payments amounting to P100 million each.
"Nabayaran na 'yung kalahating bilyon," he said. "Ngayon nakatatlong bayad na sila...[pero] kung tumigil ka sa P1.1 billion, dapat ang utang na lang nila P400 million. Pero 'di ba nag-test kami ulit so siyempre dumadagdag 'yan."
(They have paid before half a billion. Now, they made another three payments, but if you stop at only paying the P1.1 billion, the overdue remaining should be at P400 million. But if you recall, we started testing again so you would have an increase in the debt.)
PhilHealth made its first payment on October 27 of P500 million, which led to Red Cross resuming its coronavirus screenings. Gordon had since given the agency a three-day deadline in what he said was to prevent the debt from ballooning once again.
The next P100 million came by November 5, with its President and CEO Dante Gierran vowing to fast track the settling of the remaining debt.
Red Cross has conducted the most number of coronavirus tests in the country at over one million, more than what state-run laboratories have run so far.
Its move to suspend tests for at least a week in October then, had threatened the country's overall COVID-19 screening capacity, with daily tests down by at least in half with no outputs from the humanitarian organization.
Government had since denied that they are relying heavily on Red Cross, but later on admitted that its contributions had been significant to the country's fight against the pandemic.
The senator also came to the defense of the University of the Philippines after President Rodrigo Duterte's threat last night to defund the state-run institution.
Duterte's latest remarks are part of his weekly address on Tuesday that saw false claims and sexist remarks hurled against Vice President Leni Robredo and has since met criticism.
The president had responded to calls for an academic strike by students over what they said was government's poor response to the recent typhoons that hit the country.
RELATED: Duterte to students: Pandemic, disaster response 'not your worry'
"You stop school and I will stop the funding. All you ever do is recruit communists there," Duterte said in mixed Filipino and English, but this was clearly misplaced, as the strike came from students of the Ateneo de Manila, and not UP.
In the same forum, Gordon, a UP Law alum, sought to remind the president of the many contributions of graduates of the university, including COVID-19 frontliners such as those in the Philippine General Hospital.
"Tandaan niyo Mr. President, marami kayong kaibigan sa PGH. Kung wala 'yang PGH maraming namatay sa COVID," he said. "Marami tayong doktor sa PGH, marami tayong engineer [and] even in your Cabinet maraming taga-UP. So siguro uminit lang ang ulo ni presidente."
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