Helping improve access to cancer treatment

ADVOCACY partners from Philam Life, Intellicare, Maxicare, Medicard, PhilCare, ValuCare, Roche, People Management Association of the Philippines (PMAP), L’Oreal Philippines, Magnolia Lifedrink, and Insight TechSystems.

As the incidence of cancer continues to rise, so does the cost of its treatment.

A great number of Filipinos who have been diagnosed with the dreaded Big C—which claims thousands of lives every year—often do not get the chance to fight the disease due to the skyrocketing costs of treatments.

“The fact that screening and detection methods, as well as treatments are expensive, many patients do not get the diagnosis early and inevitably cannot afford the medication necessary,” noted Jong Merida, managing director of Insight Tech Systems Management Inc., an IT-enabled knowledge process outsource (KPO) company.

Cost of treatment

This is why much of the dread associated with cancer also partly comes from the ready acknowledgement by a vast majority of Filipinos that the cost of treatment is simply not within their means, Merida said in a recent press briefing.

Merida admitted that a big part of the fight against cancer is also anchored on a patient’s financial means to afford a treatment, as the medical world already provides options to help cure cancer at its early stages. Some would be fortunate enough to have access to health maintenance organizations (HMOs), but experience has shown that their coverage limits are consumed far before full treatment can be completed.

“For the Filipinos who rely solely on the National Insurance System support, funds would have long been exhausted even before treatment can commence,” Merida shared.

“The reality in the Philippines, insofar as cancer is concerned, is many more die from the disease because treatment was not even started at all. The death sentence that many view cancer with is associated as much with the medical nature of the disease as it is with the financial solution each citizen is confronted with,” he further explained.

Fighting cancer

Fortunately, private companies across industries have banded together to help the government improve Filipinos’ access to cancer treatments.

Roche Philippines, Philam Life, partner HMOs (Intellicare, Maxicare, Medicard, Philcare and ValuCare), People Management Association of the Philippines (PMAP), L’Oreal Philippines, Magnolia Lifedrink and Insight TechSystems recently launched the country’s pioneering “Embrace Time Cancer Advocacy.”

The Embrace Time Cancer Advocacy is expected to provide the working Filipino with the means, the avenue and the reason to fight cancer—thus, leading a pioneering effort to fight cancer from two critical dimensions of treatment and financing.

More importantly, this advocacy seeks to extend this program to the largest segment of the Filipino population and will endeavor to establish the mechanisms and platforms necessary, so that every Filipino can gain access to the financial infrastructure, which in turn guarantees that he can afford the cost of treatment against cancer.

Among the programs being introduced under this advocacy is the country’s first Group Cancer Insurance Program.

Lilet Potenciano of Roche Philippines said the pharmaceutical company co-developed this cancer program with Philam Life.

“Philam Life designed and developed the cancer insurance product while Roche Philippines provided cancer-related information such as cancer incidence rates, cancer treatment guidelines, treatment costs which facilitated the product development,” Potenciano explained.

And while cancer insurance is not exactly new, it has been very limited to few individuals who can afford to pay the corresponding premiums at their own personal expense.

To bridge the gap, Philam Life’s Group Cancer Insurance Program is being offered as an added inclusion to the existing HMO insurance coverage packages currently given by employer-sponsored HMOs.

Partnership

“The Group Cancer Insurance Program is a first-of-its-kind partnership between Philam Life and leading HMOs in the country. This program will create the funding mechanism for expensive cancer treatment via Philam Life’s affordable group cancer insurance product,” explained Philam Life vice president Erwin Go.

Offered to companies, institutions and other groups primarily through the HMO partners, the Group Cancer Insurance Program provides higher health coverage at affordable premiums by pooling the risks of a large group of people to subsidize the needs of individuals in the group who might develop cancer.

Ultimately, this insurance plan seeks to save lives that may otherwise have been lost meaninglessly to cancer.