Replies to LegCo questions

LCQ12: Additional income from new and increased medical fees

    Following is a question by the Hon Andrew Cheng and a written reply by the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, Dr York Chow, in the Legislative Council today (June 29):

Question :

    Regarding the additional income derived from new and increased fees for medical services in public hospitals, will the Government inform this Council:

(a)  of the annual additional income the relevant authorities received from new and increased medical fees in public hospitals since 2002, broken down by various charging items, as well as the amount and percentage of such additional income allocated to the Hospital Authority (HA);

(b) of the annual administrative expenses incurred by HA in charging new fees and processing fee waiver applications; and

(c) whether the authorities have considered allocating to HA the entire additional income derived from any future increase in medical fees?

Reply :

Madam President,

(a) New charges for Accident & Emergency (A&E) service and for drugs at specialist outpatient clinics were introduced in November 2002 and May 2003 respectively.  A revision of existing medical charges, including inpatient charges and charges for general and specialist outpatient services, was implemented in April 2003.  The additional incomes generated by the Hospital Authority (HA) from new and increased fees since 2002-03 are shown in the table below -  

Income Source            2002-03  2003-04  2004-05 


                         ($ Mn)   ($ Mn)    ($ Mn)


Accident & Emergency 


charge (A&E) services      51.2     119.5    136.8


Drug charge at specialist


clinics                    0        65.4     73.7


Inpatient services         0        37.2     108.8


Specialist outpatient


services                   0        49.3     65.4


Community services         0        0.3      2.7

    In determining the level of annual subvention for HA, Government would usually take into account HA's estimated requirements less income available.  For the above new charges and revision of existing fees, however, we have agreed on an exceptional basis that the following would not be subvention-deductible -

* 50% of the income from the new charges (i.e. A&E and drug charges) on a permanent basis; and

* 100% of the income from increases in existing fees for two years, (i.e. 2003-04 and 2004-05).
Accordingly, the dollar amounts of net additional income available to the HA are about $25.6 million for 2002-03, $271.7 million for 2003-04 and $387.4 million for 2004-05.

(b) The expenditure incurred by the HA in collecting the new charges and processing fee waiver applications are subsumed under its general administrative expenses and not routinely collated.  

(c) The Government is conducting a new round of review on public medical fees with a view to targeting government subsidies to patients and services most in need as well as redressing the imbalance between the public and private services.  While the review may involve an increase in medical fees having regard to affordability of members of the public, we have not made any decision on the allocation of the additional income that may be generated as a result at this stage.

 

 

 

Ends/Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Issued at HKT 16:03

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