The city’s public hospitals owed a record HK$52 million last year, much of which came from mainlanders who gave birth in Hong Kong, and refused to pay for their treatment
EMILY.TSANG@SCMP.COM
UPDATED : Monday, 25 April, 2016, 8:30am
Patients awaiting to be taking care of at the Accident and Emergency Department at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Jordan. Photo: Sam Tsang
The city’s public hospitals were lumped with a record HK$52 million in bad debts last year - the bulk of which was the result of mainlanders refusing to pay their fees after receiving treatment in Hong Kong, the Hospital Authority has claimed.
The outstanding charges last year were a 15 per cent increase on the previous year.
According to the authority, HK$7.6 million in debt was incurred by mainland women who went to Hong Kong accident and emergency units to give birth, in order to obtain right of abode for their newborns.
Critics said the government had failed to tighten up its means of collecting outstanding fees from mainlanders.
“Even though there is no way to turn away mainland patients with urgent medical needs due to humanity reasons, there should be more administrative measures to make them pay,” said lawmaker and doctor Kwok Ka-ki.
Ki said, for example, mainland women who gatecrashed the emergency wards for delivery should be made to pay their medical bills before the government issues a Hong Kong birth certificate for their baby.
Public hospitals operate largely on government’s subventions to provide a near-free service to Hongkongers. This year the fund went up by 3.4 per cent to a record HK$51.6 billion.
The record HK$52 million in bad debts accumulated last year was up from $45 million in 2014 .
Since local patients can use the service at a low cost, it is understood the bulk of the debt was incurred by non-local patients, who provided fake addresses and skipped town after service.
A Hospital Authority spokeswoman said they would post the medical bill to patients and call them to remind them to settle the fee. Legal action would be taken if the bill was not settled, she said.
Since the “zero quota” policy in 2013, where the government banned non-local women from booking into Hong Kong maternity wards, there are still around 800 babies born to mainland parents in the city every year.
Since 2013, public hospitals increased charges to about HK$100,000 for non-local mothers who give birth at the accident and emergency wards - covering the rate for the delivery and the first three days of hospitalisation in general wards.
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/1938264/hong-kong-public-hospital-debts-rise-mainlanders
