CABINET CONSIDERS COVERING TREATMENT COST FOR CHILDREN SICK WITH FLU

Prime Minister J.Erdenebat has tasked his cabinet members to take necessary measures such as revising regulations to facilitate allowing parental leave for legal guardians of the children, who are down with respiratory illnesses. The government might even consider covering the treatment costs from the health insurance fund.

According to a presentation by the Health Ministry, patients with respiratory illnesses are making up 5.5 percent of the total number of patients being treated in ambulatories, in the recent days. In the same period of last year, the in-patient treatment load in hospitals of Ulaanbaatar exceeded by 18.5 percent. Due to the overload and lack of beds in hospitals, parents and children receive a day or two days of treatment in ambulatories.

Pursuant to the current regulations, the health insurance covers the treatment costs of more than five days. The shortfall of  necessary antibiotics for children and ineffectiveness of the short-term treatment have been observed.

The head of the Mongolian government assigned the associated Ministers to study the feasibilities to allocate over MNT 1.0 billion funding required to cover costs of treatment  and medicines for the most dominant disease among children, organize quarantines in certain areas basing on the recommendations of the local healthcare facilities and adjust the seasonal breaks of general education schools.

Nearly 90 percent of the patients suffering from acute respiratory infection are children aged below 4 years, of whom 35 percent are infants younger than one year-old. Out of these children, 56 percent are down with pneumonia and 22 percent –with acute bronchitis. Nevertheless, no children has died from pneumonia in the last couple of months, reported the Ministry of Health.

Source:http://en.montsame.mn/politics/cabinet-considers-covering-treatment-cost-children-sick-flu