April 22, 2009
INTERNATIONAL ENVI-HEALTH GROUP CALLS FOR SOUND RP HEALTH BUDGET ON EARTH DAY
Health Care Without Harm-Southeast Asia (HCWH-SEA) together with the Alternative Budget Initiative (ABI) and the Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC) today called on concerned government agencies to make sure that items in the General Appropriations Act “assist the country and not further aggravate debt.”
At the Bulong Pulungan forum in Sofitel, Manila, the three organizations highlighted two items in the health budget—the unreleased P100-M allocation for the purchase of medical waste treatment facility for government-run hospitals which is in the 2008 GAA and the US$2-million payment for defunct medical waste incinerators which the government started paying in 2002 and will continue to pay until 2014.
“We believe that these two issues deserve our outmost attention,” said Merci Ferrer, Executive Director of HCWH-SEA. “We know that there are other dubious items not just in the health budget but in other agencies’ as well. But right now, we want to focus on these.
“Continuous degradation of our planet calls for action from all sectors of the society. A medical waste treatment facility in the form of autoclaves will ease the burgeoning problems on medical waste disposal.
“The cancellation of the defunct medical waste incinerator loan, on the other hand, will provide our health department more than enough budget for sound alternative to waste disposal that will not sacrifice care for the environment.”
Disposing Medical Waste
In the 2008 GAA, P100 million was appropriated for autoclaves for medical waste treatment in the budget approved for the Department of Health (DoH). However, to date, the project is awaiting endorsement and approval by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).
Since the use of incinerators to dispose medical wastes has been banned by the 1999 Clean Air Act, autoclave is among the accepted methods to treat waste. According to a World Health Organization report, waste produced by health care facilities carries a higher potential for infection and injury than any other kind of waste.
Although the third highest allocation in the 2008 GAA, health budget accounts only for 1.25% of the total budget. For 2009, health budget is less than one-tenth of debt interest.
“With the limited health budget, the least we want is for an appropriated budget to end up an unreleased and revert back to the national treasury and thus be appropriated to other agencies or projects as deemed necessary by the President,” said Ferrer.
“We urge DoH to seriously follow-up on the release of this budget.”
Stop Toxic Debt
Bringing the issue further, “we are also calling for the cancellation of the 1997 Austrian loan which financed the Austrian project for the establishment of waste disposal facilities and upgrading of the medical equipment standard in DoH hospitals, amounting to Php503 million.”
The government started paying the principal and interest payments in 2002 and now pays an average of US$2 million a year and will continue to pay until 2014.
The incinerators were decommissioned in 2003 with the enactment of the Philippine Clean Air Act of 1999 prohibiting the use of incinerators.
“US$2-million is a huge amount that the health department could instead use for the delivery of basic health services or installation of non-burn treatment technology,” Ferrer pointed out.
In 2008, total health budget is only 7.7 per cent of the total amount automatically allocated to debt interest payments. For 2009, health budget is less than one-tenth of debt interest. 3
“This is clearly culpable for our poor health situation,” she exclaimed.
Another questionable aspect of the incinerators is its failure to meet standards set by European Union limits in 2001.
“With other burning issues in our health sector, we must say no to payment of incinerators that are obviously rejects from Austria.”
Health Care Without Harm (HCWH) is a global coalition of more than 400 organizations in more than 50 countries working to protect health by reducing pollution in health care sector. For more information, visit www.noharm.org. (30)
Contact:
Sonia G. Astudillo, Communications Officer, +63 918 9182369, sonia@hcwh.org
Merci Ferrer, Executive Director, + 63 920 9056113, merci@hcwh.org
1 Autoclave uses steam under pressure to treat cultures and stocks, sharps, materials contaminated with blood and limited amounts of fluid, isolation and surgery wastes, laboratory wastes (excluding chemical wastes), and soft waste.
2 A New Partnership for Handling Medical Waste, October 1, 2001. Retrieved March 20, 2009 from http://www.eponline.com/articles/53469/
3 Briones, Leonor, Romancing the 2009 deficit, March 16, 2009.
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