On Friday in the House of Assembly, Health and Social Development Minister Vincent Wheatley disclosed the amounts the National Health Insurance programme paid to the top five local healthcare providers from January 2019 to January 2024.
However, he refused to name them.
In response to questions from opposition member Stacy Mather (R-at large), who asked for the providers’ names and the amount paid to each, Mr. Wheatley said, “Permit me not to call names at this point in time, but you will have the names.”
He then went on to list the amounts paid during the period, beginning with “provider one,” which received about $30.6 million. “Provider two” received about $21.3 million; “provider three” about $18.5 million; “provider four” about $11.1 million; and “provider five” about $10.8 million, he said.
In total, NHI paid more than $92 million to the five providers between 2019 and 2024, according to the minister.
Strategies
In a follow-up question Mr. Mather asked, “Could the minister please outline any initiatives or plans to reduce this?”
Mr. Wheatley replied, “There are several strategies we are employing to attack just that problem. Basically [we’re] looking at the way we do accounting, we do billing; and the way the legislation works between the [BVI Health Services Authority] through the contracts committee and the private sector.”
Mr. Wheatley stressed the importance of such initiatives.
“We know healthcare is very, very expensive, and if it’s not handled properly, even to the sense of some level of price control, it gets out of hand,” he said. “Then it’s a serious problem.”
