Opposition lawmaker blasts Yoon’s pledge to help premature babies as ‘futile show’

President Yoon Suk Yeol had pledged to increase medical fees for intensive care units for newborns and high-risk mothers, including surgeries on premature babies weighing less than 1.5 kilograms.

However, critics have dismissed President Yoon’s promise, pointing out that it is nothing more than a “futile show” to appease the medical community,

“The government's useless show will no longer work,” Rep. Lee Joo-young of the New Reform Party said at a Monday party meeting at the National Assembly. Lee is a former pediatrician who has treated emergency patients at a pediatric emergency center for 10 years.

“The government said it was going to strengthen support for essential healthcare. President Yoon visited a NICU and announced a plan later to increase surgical fees for premature babies weighing less than 1.5 kilograms,” Rep. Lee said. “That’s a good word. However, I was shocked by what I saw, and the medical community also finds it laughable.”

Noting that the bottom 3 percent of surviving babies typically weigh between 2 and 2.3 kilograms, Lee questioned how focusing on rare cases of 1.5-kilogram babies—far outside the standard deviation—and increasing fees for such exceptional situations would benefit the medical community.

“It's like saying they're going to increase fees for a CPR that lasts more than an hour, or a fetal surgery, which is done about 20 cases a year nationwide, or for a procedure when all three blood vessels that feed the heart are blocked,” Lee said.

Lee said the government always says the same thing, pointing out that it doesn’t want to spend money while trying to advertise itself as actively supporting the medical community, so this is the only way they can do so. She added that the medical community has been fooled many times already, and the government's rhetoric won't work anymore.

“The public is also losing hope. The government's useless show will not work anymore,” Lee said. “Stop summoning busy hospital directors and key medical personnel who are already pressed for time. All we need is the government's determination.”

On Oct. 28, President Yoon visited the Catholic University of Korea Seoul St. Mary's Hospital, where the quintuplets are hospitalized. At a meeting to support the healthy growth of premature babies, he said he would drastically strengthen support for premature babies throughout the delivery, treatment, and upbringing process.

Yoon said the government would establish a network to transfer mothers to appropriate medical institutions for treatment according to their severity and risk and expand customized support for premature babies by significantly raising the medical expenses limit to 10 million won ($7,133).

Yoon said the government would also strengthen medical fees for intensive care units for newborns and high-risk mothers and raise insurance benefits for high-risk medical procedures, such as surgery for children weighing less than 1.5 kilograms.

He also vowed to expedite healthcare reforms to address these issues at their core.