Covid-19 patients unvaccinated by choice to pay their own medical bills from Dec 8
COVID-19 patients who are unvaccinated by choice will have to foot their own medical bills from Dec 8, said Health Minister Ong Ye Kung at a multi-ministry taskforce briefing on Monday (Nov 8).
This will apply to all unvaccinated Covid-19 patients admitted on or after Dec 8 to hospitals and Covid-19 treatment facilities.
The medical bills for those ineligible for vaccination - such as children under the age of 12 or medically ineligible people - will still be fully paid for by the government.
Patients who are unvaccinated by choice may still tap on regular healthcare financing arrangements, the Ministry of Health said.
Singaporeans and permanent residents (PRs) can access regular government subsidies and MediShield Life/Integrated Shield Plan where applicable, while long-term pass holders may tap on their existing financing arrangements such as private insurance.
Those who are only partially vaccinated will not be charged until Dec 31 to allow them time to be fully vaccinated.
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From Jan 1 next year, only citizens, PRs and long-term pass holders who are fully vaccinated and have not recently travelled will have their Covid-19 medical bills fully paid for by the government.
Currently, unvaccinated persons make up a sizeable majority of those who require intensive inpatient care and disproportionately contribute to the strain on our healthcare resources said the ministry in its statement.
"Our hospitals prefer not to have to bill these patients at all, but we have to send this important signal to urge everyone to get vaccinated if they are eligible," said Ong. "Billing will still be based on our current subsidy framework subject to Medisave use and MediShield Life claims. So it will still be highly supported and highly subsidised."
Separately, the minister added that children aged 5 to 11 might be able to receive vaccines soon.
The expert committee on Covid-19 vaccination (EC19V) has noted that the Pfizer-BionTech/Comirnaty vaccine has been approved by the United States for this age group.
"Our expert committee has studied the data and agreed with the conclusions of the US review. They have assessed that in Singapore, it is beneficial for children to receive the vaccines especially in the current setting of community transmissions," said Ong.
"The expert committee will - we expect maybe in the second half of this month - make a recommendation on the use of the Pfizer-BionTech/Comirnaty vaccine," he said.
Meanwhile, MOH is embarking on a study involving several hundred children in this age group who will receive the recommended smaller dosage.
"This is mainly to see how we can best operationalise processes and efficiently extract the desired reduced doses for children once EC19V confirms its recommendations for vaccinating the larger proportion of children between these age groups," said Kenneth Mak, MOH's director of medical services.
"Once we are able to do so consistently, we will then be able to provided an extended national vaccination programme that gives parents the added assurance that their children can be further protected against getting a severe Covid-19 infection," he said.
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