In order to reduce public opposition to national health insurance reforms, the Executive Yuan, Department of Health, and KMT legislators revised the New Health Insurance premium calculation to exclude total household income on Thursday. According to Health Minister Yaung Chih-liang, the draft amendment will be revised further and re-submitted to the Legislative Yuan on Monday. Yaung hopes that the draft can be passed on Tuesday.

Cabinet officials and KMT lawmakers met on Thursday evening to revise the Department of Health's national health insurance premium calculations.

The amendment drops total household income as the basis for premium calculations, and instead expands the basis of premium calculations to include wages, foreign income, capital gains, and pension income.

To address the Bureau of National Health Insurance's financial woes, the revisions also raise the "health tax" on tobacco products, increase securities transaction taxes by .05%, and pave the way for a wealth tax.

Civic groups are blasting the government for backtracking on reforms and accusing lawmakers of caring more about getting re-elected than making the right decisions.

In response, Health Minister Yaung Chih-liang said that revisions to second-generation health insurance reforms were expected,

and that the DOH will be submitting a new draft to the Legislative Yuan on Monday in the hopes of seeing them passed on Tuesday.

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