Budget 2020 - Healthcare



Budget 2020 also stated that there would be an initial allocation of RM 60mil to kickstart pneumococcal vaccine for children.

The initiative is a good start, however the RM 60mil would not be enough to vaccinate all of the 450,000 birth cohort and the cost of refrigeration required to hold the single dose vials.

There is a RM 25mil allocation for the Malaysian Healthcare Travel Council (MHTC)  as 2020 is a Malaysia Year of Healthcare Travel 2020.

MHTC is an agency under the Finance Ministry that coordinates with the various private hospitals in facilitating medical tourists from abroad and it also promotes the country’s medical tourism sector overseas.
Meanwhile, the move to allow an Employees Provident Fund (EPF) withdrawal for fertility treatment such as in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) is lauded. 
The reason for the move is because the fertility rate in Malaysia has fallen alarmingly from 4.9 children per woman in the 1970s to 1.9 children per woman, which is below the replacement level.
There is also an income tax relief of up to RM 6,000 that was announced to include on expenses incurred on fertility treatment which is an expansion of the definition for medical treatment of serious illnesses tax relief category.
It notes that currently some 70% of of the infertile patients are local with international patients comprising the remainder 30%.
/12-10-2019

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