Lowering the health contribution for entrepreneurs is getting closer. Today The Senate voted for acceptance without amendments to the Act on healthcare services financed from public funds and some other acts reducing the health contribution for entrepreneurs from 2026.
Read also: Health contribution. Check who will gain and who will lose. [WYLICZENIA]
Amendment it involves a loss of revenues from contribution to the NFZ in the amount of approx. PLN 4.6 billionwhich the government declares to cover from the state budget.
58 senators voted in favor of receiving without amendments to the law. There were 36 against, three abstained from voting. The act will now go to the desk of President Andrzej Duda, who will have 21 days to sign it, veto or refer to the Constitutional Tribunal.
What do the changes mean? The expert explains.
“JIf the law would come into force, this would mean deepening the addiction of the National Health Fund on the state budget. Health protection will compete even more with other areas of the state with limited budgetary funds” – said in an interview Wojciech Wiśniewski, a health expert from the Federation of Polish Entrepreneurs, representing the social side in the Tripartite Health Protection Team.
Wiśniewski emphasizes that His independence from the state budget has been a great value of the Polish health care system for years. Financing of treatment was based on the health premium at the National Health Fund.
“Unfortunately, another decision was made” – he concluded.
Wojciech Wiśniewski pointed out that during work in the Senate on the amendment, senators representing various environments emphasized the need for a broad discussion on financing health care in the future.
“And this is good news. We intend to ask senators as a social side to carry out such a debate. Such an opportunity to talk about the actual needs of the system is rare. But for now we are waiting for the President's decision” – he said.
During the debate on the reduction of the premium during the plenary meeting of the Senate, Deputy Minister of Finance Jarosław Neneman announced that The financial plan of the National Health Fund at 2025 is still not approved by the Minister of Finance.
“I can't answer why” – he admitted.
“The reason is known” – says Wiśniewski.”NFZ expenses are greater than planned revenues. And there was no reason why the finance minister does not sign the fund's plan. And even these reasons intensify. I do not see a perspective in which the Minister of Finance will sign a plan, “the expert assessed.
Read also: Entrepreneurs will pay more. “The government must hurry up”
He also noted that without an additional PLN 15 billion In the second half of the year, the health care system awaits “perturbations“.
“It seems that there is a moment when you can't close your eyes and pretend that there is no problem” – he concluded.
