Proposal to increase health insurance support for students from 30% to 50%

At the conference, the Ministry of Health proposed raising the health insurance premium support level to at least 50% for students from grades 1 to 12, instead of the current 30%.

The draft Decree is expected to be submitted to the Government for approval on May 15 and will take effect from July 1, 2025, replacing Decree No. 146/2018, Decree No. 75/2023 and Decree No. 02/2025 of the Government.

According to the report of Vietnam Social Security, currently 94.2% of the population participates in health insurance. By 2030, the rate of health insurance participation will reach over 95% of the population; over 95% of people using primary care services at grassroots health facilities will be covered by health insurance.

Regarding this issue, Deputy Director of the Health Insurance Department, Ministry of Health Vu Nu Anh said that currently, the monthly health insurance premium for students is equal to 4.5% of the basic salary. Of which, 30% of the premium is supported by the State budget, and the remaining 70% is paid by students themselves.

Recently, the Ministry of Health has received many opinions and proposals from voters in many localities regarding exemption and reduction of health insurance premiums for students. In addition, when drafting the amended and supplemented Law on Health Insurance (effective from July 1, 2025, except for some articles effective from January 1, 2025), many National Assembly deputies said that students should be able to participate in health insurance flexibly.

Because in a large family, if students only receive 30% support from the State budget, the amount to be paid will be higher than if they participate as a household.

Regarding this issue, the Deputy Director of the Health Insurance Department said that the health sector expects the state budget to increase by VND3,700 billion to raise the health insurance contribution support level from 30% to 50% after assessing the impact on high school students from grades 1-12.

With 2.8 million students, the Ministry of Health proposed to keep the support level at 30%. The drafting agency has specifically added this issue and will submit it to the Government in the near future. In case the Government supports the health insurance payment level to increase to 50%, each student only needs to pay 631,800 VND/year (nearly 53,000 VND/month).

In the draft Decree detailing and guiding the implementation of a number of articles of the Law on Health Insurance, which is being consulted, the method of paying health insurance for a number of groups of subjects, the Ministry of Health continues to propose a regulation of 4.5% of monthly salary, salary used as the basis for paying social insurance, pension, and basic salary as prescribed in Decree No. 146. The Ministry of Health explains that the reason for keeping this contribution level is because the Health Insurance Fund is currently still in surplus and to stabilize the investment and business environment for enterprises.

In addition, the draft also stipulates the level of health insurance contribution support for groups of subjects such as village and hamlet health workers; village and hamlet midwives; non-professional workers in villages and residential groups according to regulations; people participating in the force to protect security and order at the grassroots level; victims of bombs, mines and explosives after the war; people awarded the title of People's Artisan, Meritorious Artisan according to the provisions of the Law on Cultural Heritage. The minimum support level is equal to 50% of the contribution level.

Source: https://baotayninh.vn/de-xuat-nang-muc-ho-tro-dong-bhyt-cho-hoc-sinh-tu-30-len-50--a188165.html