It is evident that the nurses are not too pleased with their working condition following their recent demonstration. However, the Health Insurance Bureau has actually been allocating subsidies to the top hospitals across the island for the past two years. So what happened to the fund and its intended purpose? Here on CTS, we explain.

Each year, national health insurance bureau has allocated a budget of 1 billion NTD for hospitals to improve the quality of hospital nursing performance given the long working hours and stress that medical staff have to endure.

The fund is intended for pay raise or additional nursing staff.

Surprisingly, many hospitals saw the fund as income and didn't use the fund as stipulated.

The bureau raises the fund from more than 800 million two years ago to 1 billion NTD this year.

But since no specific purposes were made, the bureau is making the correction by specifying the intended purposes.

According to the bureau, hospitals that have been granted the subsidy will need to submit a report on how the money is used within three months after the fiscal year ends, which means the end of March next year.

The bureau will conduct due diligence and make sure the money is well-spent to alleviate the burden of nurses.