The Cabinet on Friday accepted a plan to discontinue the use and issuance of health insurance playing cards ranging from December subsequent yr in an effort to unify them with My Quantity identification playing cards.
“Selling the utilization of My Quantity insurance coverage playing cards is an pressing process,” well being minister Keizo Takemi stated throughout a information convention following the Cabinet meeting.
“We are going to try, alongside medical establishments and the business neighborhood, to make extra residents really feel the advantages.”
The federal government goals to streamline administrative operations and enhance well being care companies by integrating the perform of medical insurance playing cards into My Number cards, which have a 12-digit quantity linking people to non-public info, together with on taxes and social safety.
The federal government has highlighted how the combination allows medical establishments to view prescription and well being checkup information, eliminating the necessity for cardholders to elucidate them and enabling docs to offer extra applicable consultations.
In June of this yr, parliament enacted a legislation to scrap the present medical insurance playing cards however set a one-year transitional interval for individuals to nonetheless use them following the discontinuation date, which is now set as Dec. 2. The general public, nonetheless, has been sluggish to take up the combination of the playing cards.
Integrating health insurance with My Quantity playing cards has been an possibility for residents since October 2021, however uptake has remained round 4%, in keeping with the well being ministry.
In the meantime, there have been hundreds of incidents during which incorrect private info wa7yd.co7yd.cos linked to My Quantity playing cards, fueling public opposition to the discontinuation of the present medical insurance playing cards.
In line with a ballot performed by Kyodo Information in the summertime, 51% of hospitals responded to a multiple-choice query by saying that they didn’t see or didn’t know the advantage of the brand new system for sufferers.
Some 31.8% stated that the My Quantity card system allowed them to assist sufferers type out points akin to redundant prescriptions or mixing of medicines.