BackIn 2012, the Thai government introduced the “Emergency Medical Claim Online (EMCO)” policy aiming to enhance people’s accessibility to private hospital services without incurring any service fees. However, its implementation faced several operational challenges due to a lack of supporting legislation, decisions of the Council of Ministers for implementation, and a lack of enforcement authority. In addition, the absence of evaluation system and confirmation of rights also hindered it effectiveness. Nevertheless, the government had realised the benefits of such policy and thereby attempted to resolve issues and difficulties by developing a “Universal Coverage for Emergency Patients (UCEP)” policy or “UCEP Rights”.
The Universal Coverage for Emergency Patients (UCEP) policy was introduced to ensure people’s full accessibility to emergency medical treatment at the nearest hospitals. This initiative aims to reduce disparities in public emergency medical care. Under this policy, patients are entitled to receive emergency medical care at the hospitals without incurring any service fees during the initial 72 hours of their first admission or until their conditions permits transfer to their registered hospitals.
On March 28, 2017, the Council of Ministers had a consultative meeting and established the criteria, procedures and conditions for specifying emergency medical expenses. In case where emergency patients are entitled to the protection under the law on Road Accident Victim Protection or the law on Life Insurance, the Ministry of Public Health proposed that they should first exercise those rights. To ensure public understanding, the Ministry of Public Health was then tasked with seeking opinions from the Ministry of Defense, the Budget Bureau, the National Economic and Social Development Council and the Ministry of Finance for further consideration and actions.
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Source: The Office of the Ombudsman of Thailand
