site.btaUnions, Employers Criticize Proposed Amendments to Health Insurance Act

Unions, Employers Criticize Proposed Amendments to Health Insurance Act


Sofia, February 23 (BTA) - Trade unions and employers criticized
proposed amendments to the Health Insurance Act at Monday's
meeting of the National Council for Tripartite Cooperation.

The Government-proposed bill provides for changes in the health
insurance of children, pupils and students. Medical services are
to be divided into an emergency, core and supplementary
package. People without health insurance will have a grace
period of six months to return to the health insurance system
after paying their health insurance contributions for three
years back. After that six-month period, everybody without
health insurance will owe the full amount of contributions since
the health insurance model was established in 2000. The
contract with a medical care provider will be terminated if
patients are systematically dissatisfied.

The social partners argued that bills should be submitted to the
National Council not after but before being approved by the
competent parliamentary committee.

Confederation of Independent Trade Unions in Bulgaria (CITUB)
Vice President Ivan Kokalov said that the bill changes the
philosophy of the health insurance model: so far the National
Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) paid for the health service,
whereas now it is proposed that the Fund purchase services. "It
is not clear why this should be done," he added.

"Yet again, the Minister of Health did not respect the social
partners and did not present the bill to us," Kokalov pointed
out.

The trade unions and the employers oppose an increase in the
number of the representatives of the State on the NHIF
Supervisory Board. According to Kokalov, this decision reduces
the social partners to a mere rubberstamp of the NHIF decisions.

CITUB do not think that the division of the package of health
services in any way meets the needs of the population. Kokalov
was also critical of the reintroduction of the so-called
arbitration, which has already proved ineffective.

The Confederation of Employers and Industrialists in Bulgaria
backs the intention to improve compliance with health insurance
contributions but finds that no measures are provided for about
access to the system of people without health insurance, said
the Confederation's President Kiril Domouschiev. He and
Bulgarian Industrial Association Executive President Bojidar
Danev also criticized the proposal to increase the State's quota
on the NHIF Supervisory Fund. "Two-thirds of the revenues are
collected from employers and employees, and only one-third is
contributed by the State. At the same time, it is proposed that
those who finance the system should be excluded from it,"
Domouschiev argued.

The Bulgarian Industrial Capital Association supports the bill
as proposed, its Governing Board Chairman Vassil Velev said. In
his words, the employers' association backs the compliance
improvement measures. "The changes in the NHIF Supervisory Board
are wrong, this is a sort of nationalization of the Fund's
management, and this is inconsistent with our civilizational
choice," Velev said.