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Here’s
how foreigners are getting around the ruling of Health
Secretary Francisco Duque III that hospitals can perform
kidney-organ transplants only when the donor is related
to the recipient.
Philippine donors are flown to Taiwan or Singapore
(read: Singapore is a better option because there’s no
visa requirement for Filipinos) where the organ harvests
are done. After surgery, the donor is given the
equivalent of P100,000 in cash and flown home right
away. The donor doesn’t even get time off to see the
sights abroad.
Now, for
those foreigners who have relatives generous enough to
donate one of their kidneys, the
Philippines
is still in their map for transplants. Such a procedure
is least a third cheaper than in the United States,
inclusive of plane fares and hotel bills. Then again,
the country’s level of medical skill and equipment is at
par with the best in the world and the after-surgery
service is oftentimes superior.
****
Wage
boards nationwide are expected to finish all their
hearings by end-May. And there’s talk that these boards,
except for the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao
(where the governor makes the decision), will recommend
an increase in the daily wage of between P50 and P130.
Interestingly, the minimum daily wage presumes there are
two people working in each family. By this definition,
this means that in Metro Manila, the minimum wage of
P362 a day is actually double. Even then, at P724,
that’s still less than the P852 a day that the national
government estimates a family of six needs to live
decently in the country’s biggest metropolis. Right now,
only a fourth of the country’s populace is conceded to
live decently or has enough money to buy food, meet
fixed household expenses such as housing, utilities and
education, and still have some savings left over for
emergencies such as illness.
****
Did you
know 1:
Aside
from Golden Acres, there are now small private homes for
the aged sprouting all over the country.
Now,
now, it’s not that Filipinos love their elderly less;
it’s just that with both husband and wife working, the
elderly are often left in the case of a maid and the
good maids are now all abroad.
Interestingly, the Filipina, on average, outlives the
Filipino by five years but the quality of life of the
elderly Filipina is significantly lower than that of the
elderly Filipino.
Did you
know 2:
The talk in Binondo is that more parents intend to
transfer their children to public schools this coming
school year due to higher tuition of private schools not
subsidized by religious organizations.
Chinese
schools, of course, follow the curriculum set by the
Department of Education but include extra subjects such
as Mandarin and Chinese math (read: this means two math
periods daily, which explains why Chinese-Filipinos are
perceived to be better at numbers than everyone else). |
