MANILA, Philippines - A partylist representative says indigent patients in public hospitals are being forced to surrender what little possessions they have - from watches to secondhand cellphones - as state institutions behave like "pawnshops" to compensate for their own underfunded state.
Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Teodoro Casiño, writing in his blog, held up the Philippine Children's Medical Center (PCMC) in Quezon City as his primary example, producing hospital documents illustrating how indigent patients who could not pay their bills are being asked to pawn personal items like old-model cellphones direct to the hospital, before the patients are released from the hospital.
The items are then auctioned off to raise funds.
A dismayed Casiño writes: "The Department of Health should act quickly and boldly to prevent our public hospitals from turning into pawnshops."
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