Christian Democrats put spotlight on health insurance in Georgia

The Christian-Democratic Movement (CDM) has initiated the creation of special insurance funds at local self-governments in the country’s regions. As CDM’s Magda Anikashvili said at the parliamentary briefing on Thursday, such funds would be used for people at the poverty level cut-off which don’t receive either healthcare insurance or financial support from the state. As Anikashvili explained, these people do not meet the relevant criteria necessary to make them eligible for the state assistance programme. Concerned about the poor living conditions such people are facing nowadays the opposition MP explained that without state support these families can’t afford the medical services necessary for their treatment.

CDM’s initiative, according to Anikashvili, is more important for the regions where the new hospitals and clinics are being opened because in the event of a person not having health insurance, he/she would not have the opportunity to use the hospitals’ services at all. “We, the Christian Democrats, encourage state representatives in the regions to increase the accessibility of healthcare services in their regions as is the case in Tbilisi and Adjara,” Anikahsvili said, discouraging the “discrimination of citizens” according to their geographical location. “We believe that each and every person should have access to medical services regardless of their place of residence,” she added.

CDM also suggested the necessity for insuring children with disabilities between the ages of 5-18. Anikashvili worried that under President Mikheil Saakashvili’s recent initiative only children below 5 would receive the health insurance packages while the other age categories remain without such support. According to Anikashvili, the insurance of 3,000 children with disabilities would require GEL 200,000 from the state budget.

Meanwhile the ruling United National Movement representative in Saburtalo District Zaza Sinauridze visited a family of pensioners and gave them healthcare insurance packages uniting a variety of services for which the state will cover 20% of planned operations and 80% of urgent operations, as well as 50% of medicine up to a GEL 200 limit. As Sinauridze stated, everyone who is not below the poverty level will receive such insurance in the next year.