SC urged to stop Orthopedic Center privatization

MANILA, Philippines - A group of indigent patients, health professionals, concerned citizens, employees and lawmakers asked the Supreme Court (SC) yesterday to stop the privatization of the Philippine Orthopedic Center (POC) in Quezon City.

In a 62-page petition for certiorari and prohibition, they urged the high court to issue a temporary restraining order enjoining the government from awarding the hospital’s P5.69-billion modernization project to Megawide Construction Corp. and World Citi Consortium.

Petitioners alleged that the government committed grave abuse of discretion when it relinquished to a private entity its duty of providing and delivering a basic social service, particularly health service.

“Like the civil and political rights embodied in the Bill of Rights, the government is constitutionally mandated to advance and protect the right to health, and other economic social and cultural rights,” they stressed.

They argued that the privatization violated Article XIII Section 11 of the Constitution, which mandates the government to “adopt an integrated and comprehensive approach to health development which shall endeavor to make essential goods, health and other social services available to people at affordable cost.”

They also cited Article XIII Section 12, which requires the government to “establish and maintain effective food and drug regulatory system and undertake appropriate health, manpower development and research, responsive to the country’s health needs and problems.”

Petitioners said the privatization of the POC, a Department of Health-retained hospital and the country’s only hospital specializing in orthopedic disorders, including cases of spinal cord injury, violated the constitutionally guaranteed right to equitable access to health services.

“The government’s obligation to providing health service to its citizen and the right to health of the people are expressly provided in the Constitution. These functions, while traditionally regarded as merely ministrant and optional, have been made compulsory by the Constitution,” they added.

Petitioners included doctors and nurses from the Network Opposed to Privatization of Public Hospitals and Health Services, Council for Health and Development, Nars ng Bayan Community Health Nurses’ Association, Alliance of Health Workers, Health Alliance for Human Rights, People’s Health Movement, Community Medicine Practitioners and Advocates Association, Head Alliance for Democracy, leaders of citizens’ groups Makabayan, Gabriela, Kalipunan ng Damayan ng Mahihirap, Kilusang Mayo Uno, and congressmen from Bayan Muna and Kabataan party-list.

Named respondents in the petition were President Aquino, Health Secretary Enrique Ona, DOH Undersecretary Teodoro Herbosa, Public-Private Partnership Center executive director Cosette Canilao, POC modernization project manager Jan Irish Villegas, National Economic and Development Authority director general Arsenio Balisacan, Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima and Consortium of Megawide Construction Corp. and World Citi Medical Center.

The POC modernization project involves the construction of a 700-bed capacity super-specialty tertiary orthopedic hospital to be located within the National Kidney and Transplant Institute (NKTI) compound along East Ave., Quezon City.

The concessionaire will design, build, finance, operate and maintain the facility until the end of the 25-year concession period, and then transfer the hospital to the DOH.