DOH: Delayed pay, deployment of public nurses due to pending release of 2019 budget

MANILA, Philippines — The pending enactment into law of the 2019 national budget contributed to the delays in the issuance of salaries and deployment of public health nurses, the Department of Health said Friday.

“The DOH is aware of the issues regarding delayed salaries and deployment of our health workers. There are several external factors contributing to the delays—one of which is the pending release of the 2019 General Appropriations Act yet to be approved by Congress,” the agency said in a statement.

Congress, however, approved the report on the proposed P3.757-trillion national budget for this year last February 8.

The budget bill has not been transmitted to Malacañang, Sen. Panfilo Lacson said.

Budget Secretary Ben Diokno was quoted in an ABS-CBN News reports as saying that the 2019 General Appropriations Bill is expected to be signed into law this month.

DOH said that upon the release of the General Appropriations Act, approximately 26,000 rural health doctors, public health nurses, rural health midwives, dentists, medical technologists, pharmacists, nutritionist-dieticians and other heath workers under the Human Resources for Health program will be hired.

Of this, 17,205 positions will be given to nurses, who will receive full benefits of a permanent employee.

“This is our direct response to the need to augment health workers but we would like to reiterate that the HRH program only works with the strong support of the LGUs,” DOH said.

Universal Health Care

The DOH stressed the importance of health workers in the realization of the Universal Health Care.

“We recognize that our health workers are the backbone of a strong health system. They are important in realizing Universal Health Care. There are gaps that clearly need to be addressed and we want to start building the health reforms that we need through the UHC,” the agency said.

Last week, President Rodrigo Duterte led the ceremonial signing of the landmark law, which would enable Filipinos to have access to quality health services at lesser cost.