THE PHILIPPINES received a rating of 58 points on a scale of 100 in the universal health coverage (UHC) service coverage index (SCI) in 2021, the World Bank said.
The World Bank’s “Tracking universal health coverage” report indicated that the Philippines’ score declined from the 60 rating in both 2019 and 2017.
“The world is off track to make significant progress towards UHC (Sustainable Development Goal target 3.8) by 2030 as improvements to health services coverage have stagnated since 2015, and the proportion of the population that faced catastrophic levels of out-of-pocket health spending has increased,” the World Bank said.
In the Philippines, medicine was among the main drivers of out-of-pocket spending.
Medicine accounted for 62% of out-of-pocket (OOP) spending in the Philippines, according to a 2012 study.
“The literature shows that medicine as a driver for OOP spending is more evident among the poorest. In the Philippines (2012), 75% of OOP spending by the poorest quintile was on medicine, whereas for the richest quintiles it was 58%,” the World Bank said.
The World Bank said that only a few countries were able to improve service coverage and minimize catastrophic OOP health spending.
“Improvements in service coverage were seen in nearly all countries since 2000, while catastrophic spending worsened or saw little change in most countries. Since 2000, only 42 of the 138 countries with available data for the same years for both UHC indicators achieved an expansion of service coverage, while reducing their respective share of the population incurring catastrophic OOP health spending,” it added. — Luisa Maria Jacinta C. Jocson
