Proposed budget cuts to the Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) could significantly hinder efforts in disease prevention and health promotion, according to nine medical associations, who issued a joint statement urging legislators to prioritize public health.
The Legislative Yuan recently reviewed the government’s 2025 general budget, which included a 60% reduction in the MOHW’s advertising budget and a 70% freeze on its operating budget. The associations warned that these cuts could severely undermine public health initiatives, leading to negative consequences for society’s overall health and well-being.
“The advertising budget is not for regular publicity, but to increase public awareness about diseases,” the statement read. “A reduction in this budget would impede health promotion campaigns, such as those encouraging vaccination and healthy eating.” The groups emphasized that if the public lacks an understanding of health policies, particularly during disease outbreaks, efforts to disseminate vital information could falter, exacerbating the spread of illnesses.
The freeze on the operating budget would affect critical public health programs, including mental health support, cancer screening, nursing staff preparedness, and epidemic prevention. The associations called on legislators to reconsider the cuts, stressing that health should be a bipartisan concern.
The nine groups involved include medical associations from Taipei, New Taipei City, Keelung, Taoyuan, and Yilan County, as well as the Taiwan Association of Family Medicine, ROC Primary Care Association, Taiwan Medical Clinics Association, and Taiwan General Medical Practitioners Association.
In a related development, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Philip Lo expressed concern over cuts to the CDC’s budget for expert travel. The legislature recently reduced the travel budget for sending experts to China for disease inspections, from NT$34,000 to just NT$6,800. Lo explained that the previous budget allowed Taiwan to send experts to Wuhan early in the COVID-19 pandemic, providing crucial information that helped prevent the virus’s spread in Taiwan. He criticized the new budget cuts, which he argued would be insufficient for future disease prevention efforts.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wang Hung-wei disputed Lo’s claims, suggesting that funds from the special COVID-19 budget were available for such trips. However, Lo clarified that the special budget was only passed after the experts had already been sent to China in January 2020, and the operations leading up to that were funded by the MOHW and the CDC’s annual budgets.
Meanwhile, other proposed budget cuts are drawing concern from advocacy groups. The Jing Chuan Child Safety Foundation criticized cuts to the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) budget for traffic safety promotion, which includes efforts to reduce child pedestrian accidents. Executive Director Hsu Ya-jen argued that cuts to these programs would hinder traffic safety awareness, enforcement, and road improvements, potentially delaying the development of safer infrastructure for children.
In the housing sector, the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) proposed reducing the National Land Management Agency’s budget by 10%, which could impact rent subsidies for low-income households. The agency warned that this could affect 750,000 households relying on rent assistance this year.
Similarly, cuts to the National Police Agency’s budget, including a freeze on over NT$3 billion, could undermine its ability to maintain public security. The agency warned that reduced funding could result in an increase in crime, particularly drug trafficking and scams, further eroding public trust in law enforcement.
Other proposed cuts include a 15% reduction in the Sports Administration’s budget, which could impact athlete funding, and reductions to the Ministry of Agriculture’s budget, which would negatively affect the poultry industry.
The Ministry of Finance also raised concerns over a proposed NT$1.845 billion cut to the Taxation Administration’s budget, which could reduce the number of chances for the public to win in the uniform invoice lottery, affecting the small rewards that many people rely on.
As the debate continues, many advocates urge legislators to carefully reconsider these cuts to ensure that vital public health, safety, and welfare programs are not jeopardized.
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