Press Releases
Transcript of media session by Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food
Following is the transcript (English portion) of a media session by the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, Dr York Chow, after officiating at the kick-off ceremony of "Share 28" camping for charity at the Victoria Park today (January 22):
Reporter: Dr Chow, could you say a few words in English on medical fees and charges?
Dr Chow: Yes, I hope people should not just criticize the amount of the adjustment that has been reported by the media recently. The main problem, I think, the main issue with the health care fees and charges, is to ensure that we have a healthy flow of patients both in the public and private sectors. At the moment, the family doctors in various districts are much more transparent in term of their services and also their fees and charges. Many of them are reasonably inexpensive. So most of the citizens can afford. If they have problems and need come to the Accident and Emergency Department, very often they cannot see the same doctor, and the doctors do not have their family's (medical) history. So the doctors could only deal with some of the emergency situation and not really their health issues. I think it is important that each citizen should have a family doctor. At the same time, we would like to look at how we can adjust our fees so that citizens could have a good concept of the value of our services. Many of our services cost a lot, particularly on the first day of admission. The average cost is roughly $4,000 to $5,000 per day. At the moment, we only charge our patients $100, which is a very small amount. In fact, a lot of people say that this is unreasonable or unreasonably cheap. So we would like to see how we can adjust the fees and charges so that they can reflect the level of services.
Reporter: Other than just increasing the fees, some say we should have a broader policy for the funding.
Dr Chow: We will first adjust the fees so that we can bring about some healthy flow of patients for both the public and private sectors. Then we will look at the more long-term issues of health care, which needs to be addressed imminently. Number one is the elderly problem. We foresee that in the coming 20 or 30 years, we will have more elders in our population. Many of them will have geriatric diseases, which will require a lot of health care. The other issue is the improvement of health care technology which also bears a great impact on health care financing. I will address those with more long-term targets. I think we should look at, firstly, how we can deal with the short-term issues, and then we should have a framework to deal with the more long-term problems.
Reporter: One more question on pig farms. Have you visited a pig farm today? What is the farmers' reaction?
Dr Chow: No, I only had a discussion with representatives of the pig farmers. They raised two issues. One is the penalty system (Demerit Point System) that we try (to make use) to regulate our pig farms. The farmers said that we were too harsh and eventually they might be driven out of business. The second issue is that they think it has become so difficult (for them to continue to operate, that they would consider) whether they would like to voluntarily return their licenses if some ex-gratia payments are paid by the Government. Both of their concerns will be considered.
Reporter: You were talking about some sort of compensation for the operators.
Dr Chow: That's what they requested us to consider. We will calculate on the basis of what sort of capital expenditure they have for the pig farms and the recurrent expenditure in raising the pigs and so on. We need to do some calculation before we can actually give them a reply.
Reporter: You may or you will give them compensation?
Dr Chow: We will actively consider their suggestions just in case they do not like to continue farming pigs, they can return their licenses voluntarily.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Saturday, January 22, 2005
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