Beirut Municipality Launches Employee Health Card

With U.S. Government funding through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Beirut Municipality launched the employee Health Card developed by SUNY/CLD as a first step in a project to enable hospital admissions to be streamlined and properly authorized and medical information to be organized and electronically stored for the more than 16,000 qualified holders including current and former employees and their dependents.


In a press conference held November 27, 2007, Acting Governor of Beirut Nassif Qaloush in his opening remarks emphasized the importance of this first step towards the modernization of medical records and payments and expressed his appreciation for the assistance related to this social initiative. SUNY/CLD Director Mahmoud Batlouni stressed those hospital admissions for those insured - often delayed in the past pending verification of coverage – will now be routine upon presentation of the Health Card and valid identification. In addition to reducing the administrative burden associated with verification of coverage, opportunities for abuse of coverage will also be minimized.

Future phases of the project will allow internal administrative processes related to medical assistance payments to be automated and medical files including hospitalization and prescription medication records to be maintained for each insured individual. Related efforts will allow the Health Card to be scanned by hospitals equipped with the proper machines and systems, offering timely access to the health and prescription medication record of patients.