Thursday, August 22, 2013

Medishield Life = Robbing Peter to Pay Paul

It is bad news when PM announced that Medishield will be turned into Medishield Life. The scheme has to break even and it is compulsory for all. Those who do not have Medishield coverage and those who could not afford Medishield will all be opted in.  Premium will go up, but details not work out yet!  It will cover pre-existing illness and for life - which means we pay till we die!

Such a scheme is equivalent to robbing Peter to pay Paul. The worst part is Peter (us) is robbed not once, but for a life time with increasing amount.  Paul has unfavorable conditions which is costly to insure.

 For those of us self-employed with no CPF contribution from employers, this is terrible. As it is, the existing premium is unpredictable and increases whenever the govt fancy. The deductible is getting higher and higher with passing years.  Many of us have to pay for our elderly parents Medishield too. The premiums for the elderly is a Nuclear Bomb because it exploded with violent with age.


The payout from Medishield is less than premium collected (no surprise since the deducted is sky high). We also know that the miserable amount budgeted for Medifund (for those who cannot pay the high medical cost) is never used up and the remainder returned to the govt reserve. These show how insincere the govt is in helping the poor and reducing healthcare cost for the masses.

As with so many govt schemes, Medishield Life looks good on paper only - being touted as affordable healthcare and giving everyone a piece of mind. In fact, I have nightmare the very night PM made the announcement.

The truth be told, this new scheme is another heavy stone tie to our feet drowning us with ever increasing healthcare cost.

Being healthy does not help as our savings in CPF medisave is continuously depleted by Medishield premium for ourselves and our parents.

The govt should control healthcare cost and stop brain washing us with the word 'affordability' and come up with more and more CPF con schemes. We have seen what they meant by affordability with HDB flats costing 0.5 to 1 million.

Since the current Medishield scheme is making a tidy sum for the govt and there is used Medifund - they should use these to support Paul and stop robbing Peter.  Besides, the GST and casino levy are suppose to help the disadvantage. It is time they tap into these instead of dipping their hands into our CPF savings again.

No comments: