• GILBERT P. BAYORAN

Good news for Barangay Health Workers (BHWs) all over the country.
Senate deputy majority leader Senator JV Ejercito announced on Tuesday that the proposed Magna Carta for Barangay Health Workers (BHWs), was approved on its third and final reading, during their plenary session on February 3.
Ejercito, who authored Senate Bill No. 2838, or the Magna Carta of Barangay Health Workers (BHWs), pointed out that the BHWs are the extension of the Department of Health’s community works, noting that they serve as part of preventive health care and also responded to the call of duty during the pandemic, by serving as frontliners.
They are heroes in their own right, he stressed.
Ejercito said the enactment of the measure will serve as a recognition and token of appreciation for barangay health workers (BHWs) for their service to communities, especially in delivering primary and preventive health care to Filipinos.
The Magna Carta of Barangay Health Workers proposes a comprehensive benefits package that significantly improves on existing legislation. Key provisions include hazard, transportation, and subsistence allowances, one-time retirement cash incentives, health and insurance benefits, vacation and maternity leave, cash bonuses, disability compensation, and Civil Service Eligibility for those who have served five continuous years or more.
Ejercito said they will prioritize first BHWs in 3rd to 5th class municipalities, where BHWs receive monthly honoraria ranging from P200 to P800 a month, unlike in first class municipalities and cities, where they get P4,000 to P12,000 a month.
In lower income municipalities, we will give P3,000 to BHWs to augment the honoraria they are receiving from the barangay, LGUs, and the province, he added.
At present, an estimated 500,000 registered and unregistered BHWs in the Philippines stand to benefit from these reforms, with many urgently awaiting the added security and respect this law would provide.
After its passage on third and final reading, Ejercito said it will be deliberated by the bicameral committee, before signing into law by the President.*