By Brian Campued
Motorists who would figure in road crashes due to drunk driving or violation of road safety protocols, such as not wearing safety gears, will soon be excluded from the “zero balance billing” (ZBB) program being implemented in Department of Health (DOH) hospitals.
This was announced by Health Secretary Teodoro Herbosa during the United Nations Press Conference on Road Safety on Thursday, noting that the DOH is still studying the issuance of such policy.
Herbosa cited that over 13,000 Filipinos died in 2023, or an average of 35 deaths a day, due to road crashes.
In July 2025 alone, the DOH’s Online National Electronic Injury Surveillance Data logged a total of 5,083 road traffic injuries—including 3,197 incidents involving motorcycle riders who were not wearing helmets or had been drinking.
“Uminom ka, nag-drive ka—you end up in the emergency department, you end up with my trauma team… if you’re lucky. The problem is 13,000 a year are not lucky. They end up dying,” he said.
“If we don’t act, we will end up with a population that is either dying on the road or permanently disabled,” he added, stressing that erring motorists must be held accountable for not following road traffic rules.
The Health chief, however, clarified that the DOH will still cover the hospital bills of road crash victims under the ZBB program as long as they were admitted to basic accommodation or ward of a DOH hospital.
Herbosa likewise emphasized that road crashes are preventable and that the goal was to reduce road traffic deaths and serious injuries by 50% in 2028.
-jpv
