2011 January 5 - 11 TOP3 [
ECONOMY]
Medical Association voices concerns over Japan’s entry into TPP
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January 11, 2011
The Japan Medical Association (JMA), consisting of 166,000 doctors, has raised its concern regarding Japan’s participation in the Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade pact on the grounds that it could trigger negative effects on the nation’s medical and nursing care systems.
At a press conference on December 3, JMA Vice President Nakagawa Toshio released the JMA’s statement on Japan’s entry into the TPP and said, “Joining the TPP will force adherence to market principles in the Japanese medical system and could end up destroying the universal health insurance system.”
The published statement points out that a free-price market will expand with the lifting of a ban on “mixed-medical services,” which include both treatments covered by the public health insurance and treatments without the insurance coverage.
“With cutbacks in the public health insurance coverage, social welfare programs will deteriorate. In the free-price market, prices of drugs and medical equipment will go sky-high, leading to increased gaps in medical services patients can receive based on their income levels,” the statement stresses.
Acknowledging “investment” as one of the fields the TPP pact emphasizes, the JMA in the statement points out, “More opportunities for private firms to run medical facilities will cause harm to patients” with a lowering in the quality of medical care and deterioration of local medical services.
