Treasury allocation for expanding health basket remains NIS 300 million

Six hundred new medical technologies proposed for inclusion in basket.

By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
New Mental Health Center for Jerusalem’s Herzog Hospital 758x530 (photo credit: KKL-JNF)
New Mental Health Center for Jerusalem’s Herzog Hospital 758x530
(photo credit: KKL-JNF)
The public committee for recommending how to expand the 2015 basket of health services, which will meet for the first time on Tuesday, has been allocated NIS 300 million, the same as for 2014, to add drugs and other medical technologies that health funds provide their members.
The Treasury has allocated the same sum for six years in a row, although costs have risen.
The committee has received 600 requests from manufacturers and importers for inclusion of their products in the basket. The committee must set priorities and decide on a final list by the end of December.
Health Minister Yael German asked Shaare Zedek Medical Center director-general Prof. Jonathan Halevy to chair the committee for the third time in a row. Finance Minister Yair Lapid approved the appointment, and Halevy agreed. Dr. Osnat Luxenburg, director of the Health Ministry’s medical technologies and infrastructure administration, remains the coordinator of the committee.
There are numerous new members of the committee, which includes clinical psychologist Dr. Sara Abu-Khef of Ben-Gurion University’s program for managing disputes; Dr. Suheir Asadi, head of the nephrology department at Rambam Medical Center; Dr.
Yair Asseraf, deputy director- general for budgeting and pricing at the Health Ministry; Prof. Haim Bitterman, chief medical officer of Clalit Health Services; Prof. Aharon Ben-Zeev, of the philosophy department of the University of Haifa; Prof. Dina Ben-Yehuda, head of hematology at the Hadassah University Medical Center in Ein Kerem; Revital Topper, Health Ministry deputy director-general in charge of supervising the health funds; Dr. David Mossinsohn, deputy director- general for medicine at the Meuhedet Health Fund; Prof. Edith Mattot, head of anesthesiology at Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center; and Rabbanit Malka Piotorkovsky, a founder of the Takana Forum and expert in religious education. Treasury officials are also members.