SINGAPORE – The announcements by the Health Ministry during the
recent debate on its budget
may not be “huge policy changes”, but they do represent important breakthroughs that mark a re-examination of several long-existing assumptions, said Health Minister Ong Ye Kung on March 8.
Speaking to the media on the sidelines of the Sembawang West Women’s Festival, Mr Ong highlighted that the focus on preventive medicine marked a departure from past healthcare policies.
“We are now prepared to extend MediShield Life to cover preventive surgery, something we have never done before,” he said, referring to the national health insurance scheme.
Besides reducing the need for painful treatment after a disease develops, he said, preventive care is also cost-effective and does not impose an additional financial burden on the healthcare system.
Mr Ong, who is also Coordinating Minister for Social Policies, added: “The best way to contain healthcare costs is to stay healthy… and that’s a central thrust of our healthcare transformation: to ensure that we practise good preventive care.”
Given this, his ministry has also recognised the changing role of MediSave, the national medical savings scheme, he said.
MediSave no longer has only one objective, which was initially meant for Singaporeans to “save up for a rainy day”, such as emergency surgery or a long-term hospital stay, Mr Ong said.
“Today, with lifespans getting longer, we are also recognising that MediSave has dual objectives,” he noted. “The second objective is to be able to practise good preventive care and manage our chronic diseases effectively. So we now need to juggle these two objectives within the MediSave system.”
