The Taipei City Government should cut residency-based restrictions for vaccine subsidies and allow more families with newborn children to benefit from the policies, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Wu Shih-cheng (吳世正) said on Wednesday.
A grandparent had complained about how his grandson was ineligible for the city government’s rotavirus vaccine subsidies, as the child’s parents had not lived in Taipei for two full years, Wu said.
The restrictions are understandable and are meant to prevent the policy from being taken advantage of by unregistered “ghosts” in the system, Wu said.
Photo: Tsai Shu-yuan, Taipei Times
However, the wait time for eligibility should be reconsidered for people who transfer their residency, he said.
The government should implement policies that reduce the burden on new parents to encourage a higher birthrate, he said, adding that based on the number of people vaccinated for rotavirus and the Taipei City Government’s funding for the program, there should be enough to consider relaxing the regulations.
Taipei Department of Health Disease Control Division Director-General Chang Hui-mei (張惠美) said that the division would take the councilor’s suggestions under advisement.
The program instituted the two-year restriction in hopes that the funding would be used for city residents first, Chang said, adding that the restriction was the minimum requirement for children to receive their Taipei City Children’s Medical Subsidy Certificates.
All subsidy programs must consider factors such as disadvantaged people, subsidization priority, the total subsidies offered and whether relaxing regulations would affect other programs, she said.
The city government began trialing rotavirus subsidies in April 2017, targeting people with Taipei City Children’s Medical Subsidy Certificates and offering subsidies ranging from NT$2,100 to NT$5,700.
Department statistics showed that there were 18,563 residents of Taipei vaccinated in 2017, 21,904 in 2018, 21,121 in 2019, 18,939 in 2020, 16,852 in 2021 and 14,782 last year.
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