Government piles PKV with gifts

Federal government overwhelmed PKV with gifts: Compulsory discounts for medicines should apply in the course of health care reform for private health insurance.

(06.09.2010) According to the will of the Federal Government, the private health insurance companies (PKV) should in future pay the same prices as the statutory health insurances. For a long time the private funds had demanded to benefit from the compulsory discounts for the medicines. Once again, the Federal Government shows that it is accelerating the weakening of the statutory health insurance funds.

Always new gifts to the private health insurance, at least that's what you have to accept when new details about the planned health care reform are revealed. According to the „Financial Times Germany“ The Federal Ministry of Health plans that private and public health insurance companies have to pay the same prices for new drugs. So far, the statutory health insurance companies were in the pricing before dividing because they do not ostensibly act economically, but is a community according to the principle of solidarity. But that should change now more and is also a declared goal of the FDP.

The Federal Association of Statutory Health Insurance Funds is currently negotiating prices and conditions with pharmaceutical manufacturers. These prices then apply to cash-desk patients, but not to private insurers. The PKV - as it is an economic enterprise - has far to pay higher prices for drugs. But that's exactly what the federal government wants to change.

Protest on these plans hailed it from all sides. Cornelia Yzer, chief executive of the Association of Research-Based Drug Manufacturers, says such an amendment states that "public pricing works in favor of private funds". Yzer sees the right to exist of private health insurance in question. It paves the way into the unit insurance. "If future social law can and should be applied to private insurance for overriding reasons, the policy would actually be on the way to the unit insurance."

The Chairman of the Board of the Federal Association of the Pharmaceutical Industry e.V. (BPI), Dr. med. Bernd Wegener already criticized last week, "Private Sickness Insurance has been fighting lawfully for years to be brought into line with statutory health insurance, and now it taunts its own policy and - where it serves its own profits - demands exactly that“ - a legal equality, explained Dr. Wegener. „A compulsory discount for motor vehicles could just as well be introduced, said the head of the association.

But the introduction of a compulsory rebate for pharmaceuticals is not the only thing the Federal Government plans to do for the benefit of private health insurance. The statutory health insurance funds should in the future literally „bleed out“. For elective rates such as chief physician treatment or single occupancy in hospitals should also be reserved from the first January only the private funds. In addition, high earners should be able to switch to private health insurance faster and easier. This decisively calls into question the social principle of health insurance companies. Because if more and more „earners“ the health insurance companies turn their backs, the financial situation of the health insurance continues to deteriorate. Ultimately, the remaining cash patients have to pay the bill with ever higher contributions and additional contributions.

Furthermore, the Federal Government is planning a health care reform „closer cooperation“ between statutory and private health insurers. Thus, both types of health insurance are expected to maintain common offices and buy services for health insurance on the same terms.

It is therefore obvious that a weakening of the statutory health insurance funds should be accelerated in order to further privatize the health care of people. The state wants to withdraw from the solidary health care more and more. Well put together, it has Wegener: „the clientele policy of the FDP continues. "(sb)

Also read:
Medicines: drug prices are rising
FDP wants to strengthen private health insurance
Chefarztbehandlung only possible with PKV?