Senator Joel Villanueva wants to increase funding for the establishment of medical schools in state universities and colleges (SUCs) nationwide to accommodate more scholars under the Doktor para sa Bayan law.
In a statement on Wednesday, Villanueva said the allocation of the seed fund for the development of medical schools of SUCs in the 2026 National Expenditure Program (NEP) remained at PHP150 million, the same level as when it was first funded in 2021.
“It’s just that when you look at the budget for this year, for 2025, we only allotted PHP150 million for the fund. It’s a stark decrease from the amounts we allotted for Fiscal Year 2022, 2023, and 2024,” he said.
“And despite the increase in the number of higher education institutions that are offering medicine, it seems this program won’t have a bright future with the way it is being funded.”
From PHP150 million in 2021, the Seed Fund received PHP250 million the following year; PHP250 million in 2023, and PHP275 million in 2024. This year, it returned to the 2021 level of PHp150 million, according to Villanueva.
During the deliberation of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) budget on Monday, Senator Sherwin Gatchalian assured Villanueva that among the proposed amendments is to raise the seed fund to PHP440 million to further boost the commission’s capacity to put up medical schools in various regions of the country.
“We must show that we are ready to support the needs of SUCs when it comes to funding. If we have one medical school per region and it becomes a center of excellence, our scholars will not hesitate to go there and study, instead of leaving their respective regions,” Villanueva said. (PNA)