The Japanese government is desperately trying to promote the use of the “MyNa Hoken Sho”, which links your health insurance card to your personal health number. The Japanese government is desperately trying to promote the use of this system, but behind the scenes, the system is actually designed to increase the cost of medical examinations if the “Mynah Hoken Sho” is used, as described in Part 1: “Seriously? The government is promoting the “Mynah Insurance Card,” and it is actually a system that will cause a “loss” to those who use it.
Below, we will explain why the “Mynah Insurance Card” is not yet widely used.
Still not available at 80% of medical institutions
The “Mynah Insurance Card” was originally scheduled to be available at medical institutions nationwide from April 1, 2021. This was clearly stated in the distribution to each household to promote the enrollment in the mina-number card.
However, just prior to the start of the program, various glitches were discovered.
These glitches were resolved and the program was fully launched on October 20 of last year. At that point, only 6% of hospitals had the necessary systems in place, including card readers.
Even if the “miner insurance card” was launched, it would be useless if only 6% of all hospitals could use it. As of April 24 this year, 22,831 hospitals have finally secured the use of the card, but this is still only 13% of the approximately 180,000 medical facilities in Japan.
According to the latest figures released on May 15, the number has increased a little more, to 19% of medical institutions and pharmacies, but still 80% of medical institutions and pharmacies are still unable to use the system.
There are several factors that may be contributing to the lack of adoption at medical institutions.
One of them is a distrust of the national system. The government spent a large amount of taxpayer money to introduce various systems, such as COCOA and HER-SYS, in response to the coronary disaster, but these systems failed at every turn. In particular, the bitter experience of the HER-SYS system, which was supposed to help the medical field, but was ultimately ineffective because of its poor usability and increased burden, and only caused confusion, still lingers among medical professionals.
Even with the system in place, only about 7% of the population actually has a “miner’s insurance card” at this point. It seems that there is resistance to increasing the burden by deliberately introducing a new system for this small number of users.
Therefore, until recently, it was said that the My Number Card would be the second step after the failed Sumikin Net.
Here, however, a surprising policy has emerged.
The policy is to abolish paper insurance cards and replace them all with “miner insurance cards.
The “whip” of taking away paper insurance cards!
On May 25, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (MHLW) announced a policy to gradually abolish health insurance cards in principle, starting next April, and unify them with the “mina-insurance card,” requiring medical institutions and pharmacies to install the system.
The government has no doubt set a goal of having every citizen have a my number card at any cost. In line with this schedule, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (MHLW) is also planning to have all medical institutions and pharmacies introduce the “Mynah Insurance Card” system by then, thereby doing away with the existing paper insurance cards.
The Social Security Council, an advisory body to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, raised a number of objections to this plan.
Next April is already less than 10 months away.
According to the Asahi Shimbun on May 31, Kenji Matsubara, vice president of the Japan Medical Association, said, “I remember that when we started this (introduction of the system), we promised that we would not make it mandatory and that we would leave the insurance card behind. When I asked him if we could keep the insurance card, he replied, ‘That’s right.
There are approximately 230,000 medical institutions and pharmacies in Japan, and it is doubtful if it is possible to introduce the system to all of them starting next April. How much taxpayers’ money will be spent for this?
Moreover, there is a majority of the population who do not even understand the concept of a personal number card, or who do not want to have a card because they are afraid of the leakage of their credit information, or because they do not see any advantage in having a card. If the “candy” of “points” does not work to move these people, then the “whip” of “disabling the use of paper insurance cards” is a very rough approach, don’t you think?
If the My Number Card were convenient, advantageous, and attractive, people would create their own cards without using such “candy” and “whip”.
I am furious at the government’s intransigence in forcing all citizens to have a my number card by holding their insurance cards hostage, without doing the “obvious” thing.
