Korea will move to expand coverage by its national health insurance program as a recent study showed its coverage rate is one of the lowest among advanced nations, the insurance operator said Monday.
According to the National Health Insurance Corp., the country's health insurance service covered only 58.2 percent of all medical expenses in 2011.
That rate is the lowest among the 11 members of the 27-nation Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development whose per capita income rose above $27,000 since 2001.
The average of the other 10 countries was 74.5 percent with Japan's health insurance program covering the highest proportion of 80.4 percent of all medical expenses, followed by Britain with a 79.9 percent insurance coverage of medical bills.
The corporation said it plans to boost the country's insurance coverage rate to around 80 percent within the next five years, partly by expanding benefits to low-income families and lowering the ceiling on the amount of money patients have to pay themselves. (Yonhap)