Page 71 - 2022 Taiwan Health and Welfare Report

2. Healthcare for Patients Affected by Polychlorinated Biphenyl (PCB) Poisoning (Yu Cheng)
(1) To safeguard the rights of patients affected by PCB contamination, the "Yu Cheng Patients Health Care Services Act" was promulgated on February 4, 2015. Benefits include making both first-generation and second-generation Yu Cheng patients exempt from NHI copayments for outpatient (and emergency) services as well as providing first-generation Yu Cheng patients with exemption on inpatient copayments, free annual health checkups, and special clinics for PCB contamination. Victims who were born in 1980 or earlier were eligible for all the benefits mentioned above. Not only that, The MOHW also established health care promotional group for the victims and offered solatium payment for surviving family members of those victims. On November 16 2016, an amendment was made to revise Articles 4 and 12 in the above Act. After the amendment, the acquisition of the solatium payment has become easier. For those victims without any surviving lineal descendants, their surviving parents could apply for the solatium payment until August 9 2020.
(2) As of the end of 2021, there were a total of 1,893 registered Yu Cheng patients, including 1,228 first-generation patients and 665 second-generation patients. A total of 17,215 victims received subsidy for outpatient (and emergency) service copayments, 92 received subsidy for their hospitalization, and 452 received free health checkups. To date, 272 applications of solatium payments for surviving family members have been approved.
▏Section 4 Prevention and Control of HCV infection
Hepatitis C virus infection is second only to hepatitis B in causing liver cirrhosis and liver
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cancer. In order to strengthen the prevention and control of HCV infection, the MOHW established the "Taiwan Hepatitis C Policy Guideline 2018-2025" and set the following three policy directions: therapy spear-heading prevention; screening support therapy; prevention securing outcomes. It is anticipated that the treatment coverage rate will reach 80% by 2025 - five years ahead of the WHO programmatic targets.
About 400,000 patients live with chronic hepatitis C (CHC) and viremia in Taiwan. Although there is no vaccine yet for hepatitis C, treating all infected patients and leaving no one behind are the best way to prevent new infection and reduce the number of infectious patients. The program for treating hepatitis B and hepatitis C patients and the pay-for-performance program for chronic hepatitis B and C patients under National Health Insurance have been implemented since October 2003 and approximately 80,000 CHC patients have already been successfully cured with interferon-based antiviral therapies. Since 2017, a nationwide program reimbursing direct-acting antiviral drugs for CHC patients has reduced financial burdens and helped to manage side effects of interferon injections to achieve higher SVR rates. With a total of 131,000 patients receiving direct-acting antivirals by the end of 2021, cure rates have reached over 99%, and the cumulative percentage of treatment coverage exceeded 52 percent. The Health Promotion Administration subsidized once-in-a- lifetime free screening for those born in or after 1966, and for those older than 45 since August 2011. Later in June 2019, the age limitation of screening program on indigenous adults was adjusted to be between 40 and 60, and over 850,000 people received the screening services. Since September 2020, the screening program has been expanded to adults aged 45 to 79 years and indigenous people aged 40 to 79 years. As the end of 2021, over 1.5 million people had participated in the program; cumulatively, more than 2.3 million people have received HCV screening tests.
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Health Care