KUALA LUMPUR: The government’s push to overhaul Malaysia’s healthcare financing framework via the Reset programme is gaining traction, with the rollout of a Universal base medical and health insurance/takaful (MHIT) product expected in the second half of 2026.
Spearheaded by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) in collaboration with the Health and Finance Ministries – and supported by the World Bank – the Reset strategy aims to slow rising medical costs and introduce a more sustainable funding model.
“The base product has a deadline, which is that we’re going to finalise the design (and conceptualisation of base MHIT product) this year,” said a spokesperson at a media workshop on the Reset Strategy by BNM and the Health Ministry yesterday.
“We’re going to pilot it sometime towards the middle of next year. And then, we’re ready for rollout by the end of next year. And the diagnosis-related group (DRG) system is a feature that will be incorporated within the base product design,” the spokesperson said.
The DRG framework – widely used in private healthcare systems globally – assigns a fixed, bundled payment for treatment based on diagnosis, rather than billing each service separately.
According to the spokesperson, it will be introduced in stages to gradually supplant the fee-for-service model currently driving medical inflation.
On intended outcomes, the spokesperson pointed to medical cost inflation as a critical barometer of success.
“We expect some stabilisation in that rather than just continual, or steeper increases over time. So we should see that stabilised. That would be a key outcome measure.
“We are also concerned about policy as well. So we are looking at things like how we can also capture data like re-admission based on that to measure quality of care as well,” the spokesperson added.
