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'Govt decided to sacrifice people': Lawmakers lambast health insurance premium increase
Lawmakers are telling the government to cancel the insurance premium hike.
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An illustration of a patient at a hospital. (Shutterstock/File)
M
embers of the House of Representatives are objecting to an increase of national health insurance (JKN) premiums, especially for participants in the third class, the lowest class in the scheme.
On Wednesday night, the House held a hearing with the insurer, the Health Care and Social Security Agency (BPJS Kesehatan), and the Health Ministry to discuss a recent presidential decision to increase the premiums.
Dewi Asmara, a member of Commission IX overseeing health and manpower from the Golkar Party, said that they disagree with the government's decision to keep increasing the JKN premiums.
Before issuing the regulation, there was a meeting between BPJS Kesehatan, the Finance Ministry, the Health Ministry and House commissions IX and XI overseeing finance to discuss the premium increase.
Dewi said at that during meeting the House members had rejected the idea to increase the insurance premiums of the third-class participants and the hikes of the premiums of those from the informal sectors.
"At that time we urged the government to find another way to solve the [JKN] deficit problem, but we see that the new presidential regulation did not respect our recommendations at the meeting," Dewi said.
The insurance members and observers protested against the new presidential regulation (Perpres) on health care security issued at the end of October. The regulation has stipulated increases of about 100 percent for the premiums of all three classes of JKN participants.
