đź“·Alliance of Health Workers | Facebook
In time of Department of Health (DOH) plenary budget deliberation at the House of Representatives for the year 2025, health workers exhort legislators to take immediate action to address severe understaffing in public hospitals and the issue of contractualization among their ranks, while also demanding for living wage and higher public hospital budget.
AHW is alarmed by the slashed budget in Personnel Services for ten (10) DOH hospitals, amounting to P369 million. The affected hospitals and their respective budget cuts are as follows:
- Amang Rodriguez Medical Center (ARMMC) – P23.4 million
- Dr. Jose Fabella Memorial Hospital (DJFMH) – P271.7 million
- National Center for Mental Health (NCMH) – P4.4 million
- National Children’s Hospital (NCH) – P18 million
- Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) – P2.3 million
- Dr. Jose N. Rodriguez Memorial Hospital/Tala – P39 million
- Basilan General Hospital – P2.3 million
- Sulu Sanitarium – P378,000.00
- Davao General Hospital – P4.1 million
- SOCCSKSARGEN General Hospital – P402,000.00
Personnel Services (PS) refer to the provisions for the payment of salaries, wages, and other compensation and benefits. The reduction in the PS budget means that more regular positions will be abolished, leading to increased contractualization.
According to Cristy Donguines, a nurse and AHW secretary general, “Does the government plan to reduce the number of health workers in these hospitals? These 10 public hospitals cater to poor patients in our country. By cutting the PS budget it will exacerbate the already dire staffing shortages in public hospitals. As a result, the delivery of quality services to the patients will be significantly affected.”
“The chronic understaffing in public hospitals has been one of the long-standing problems of health workers and the entire public healthcare system and this crisis cannot be ignored by the government. Before and after the pandemic, we have been calling for mass hiring of permanent health workers to augment the lack of manpower in public hospitals and other health facilities as well as the creation of additional plantilla positions for doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals.” Donguines added.
While public hospitals continue to face severe understaffing, there are unfilled positions that are intentionally left vacant. DOH data shows that there are 16,570 unfilled positions under the DOH Office of the Secretary, along with 685 unfilled positions at the Lung Center of the Philippines (LCP) and 385 unfilled positions at the Philippine Children’s Medical Center (PCMC).
“While vacant positions remain unfilled, the DOH continues to hire contractual health workers and this is another concerning issue in our ranks. Our initial data indicates that there are 15,000 contractual workers in public hospitals. Next year, there will be 26,035 doctors, nurses, midwives, and other health personnel who will be deployed on a contractual basis to remote areas of the country under the Human Resources for Health Program of the DOH. We health workers play a vital role in our healthcare system; thus, we demand for the regularization.” Donguines stated.
The distressing situation of health workers continues, as they work 8 to 24 hours due to the shortage of personnel, while their salaries remain low, and benefits continue to be unpaid. President Marcos Jr. issued Executive Order (EO) 64 to raise health workers’ salaries and other government employees in four tranches over four years. However, the increase for Salary Grade (SG) 1 is only P530 raising their salary from P13,000 to P13,530/month. This is just P17/day, and a Nurse 1 will only receive P81.55/day increase. It is insufficient to meet the daily cost of living of P1,200 or P33,000/month.
Public health workers urged the DOH and DBM to immediately release their performance-based bonuses for the years 2021-2023, as well as the unpaid health emergency allowances for private and LGU health workers.
This is how the Marcos Jr. government values health workers: underpaid and continually undervalued, while there are big cuts to health services, particularly in public hospitals, where patients will deeply suffer. Meanwhile, his administration’s Confidential and Intelligence Funds have swelled to ₱10.29 billion (₱4.37 billion for confidential funds and ₱5.92 billion for intelligence funds).
We demand from the legislators to stand firm against budget cuts in health and public health services and address our long-standing issues and concerns. Instead of budget cuts, we demand 5% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the health budget. #
