The Health Ministry today reiterated that health services will be exempted from the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and there will be no substantial increases in the cost of healthcare even after the implementation of GST.

In a statement today, its minister Dr S Subramaniam said the ministry would continue to play a proactive role in minimising the effects of GST on essential health services to ensure all Malaysians, particularly those in the low-income group would continue to have access to affordable healthcare.

“The implementation will be in 2015 and the Health Ministry would have continuing discussions and engagement with the Ministry of Finance to look at the entire spectrum of health services in order to minimise the effects of GST in increasing healthcare cost.

“Towards the end, we are continuously engaging with the Finance Ministry and looking at all possible angles on how this can be achieved,” he said in a statement.

The government has declared health services as GST-exempt, whereby all services which are defined as health services by the Health Ministry will be GST-exempt.

They also declared that healthcare services provided by the government will not be subjected to GST.

- Bernama