Misgovernment increases medical expenses -- Akahata editorial, June 26 (excerpts)

The House of Councilors started discussing a bill for adversely revising the medical insurance system.

The Koizumi Cabinet wants to increase patients' burden of medical expenses by 1.5 trillion yen on the grounds that the medical insurance finance is in a crisis.

What has brought about the financial crisis in medical insurance and who is responsible for that? These questions need to be answered in order to establish a reliable medical insurance system.

Japanese Communist Party House of Councilors Member Koike Akira in the House's Plenary Session pointed out two problems that cause shortfalls in the government-managed medical insurance system for small- and medium-sized business employees.

One is that insurance premiums have decreased since 1998 due to corporate restructuring and wage cuts.

The other is that the government has decreased its share in operating the insurance system, even though its finance is in deficit.

The financial difficulty in the government-operated medical insurance system has been caused by misgovernment. The government must not shift the responsibility on to the people and increase insurance premiums and patients' medical costs.

The JCP proposes to establish a reliable medical insurance system through the following three measures:

First, the government share in the medical insurance finance should be increased to the previous level. This will be possible if large-scale public works projects and military expenses are cut.

The medical insurance system will become a sustainable one when the government is responsible for its finance.

Secondly, medicine prices should be decreased, as they are ridiculously higher in Japan than in many other Western countries. As a precondition of a serious discussion of this, political donations from pharmaceutical companies should be banned.

Thirdly, prevention, early diagnosis, and early treatment of diseases should be systematically provided. The adverse revision of the medical insurance system which will increase patients' payments at hospitals runs counter to this need, because it will discourage people from going to hospital for treatment.

The bill for adversely revising the medical insurance system must be scrapped. (end)