Two new free medical and health programs of UNTV for the country’s indigents were among the recent projects launched by Kuya Daniel Razon during the station’s ninth anniversary celebration this month of July.

The station will distribute Free UNTV Health Coupons and UNTV-sponsored PhilHealth insurance cards to qualified indigents, thus expanding UNTV’s free daily medical services availed through regular medical missions and Clinic ni Kuya.

“We are expanding our public service initiatives and we want to reach more people,” the broadcast journalist stressed before the attendees of the UNTV anniversary celebration on July 18 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Makati City.

UNTV Health coupon holders can use the coupons in UNTV-affiliated hospitals and health care institutions. As for the PhilHealth cards, the station will sponsor the annual premium required to maintain the membership. With the new health care programs, a wider scope of communities and the country’s poor are target beneficiaries.

The timing of the launch was very apt after President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III reported during the 4th State of the Nation Address on July 22 this year that the number of Filipinos with PhilHealth coverage went up from 62% to 81%.

The 19% rise, however, still excludes the informal sector and the indigenous people. However, the Chief Executive promised that they will get their share soon.

While the government is still on the process of making its health care program available to the poorest of the poor, UNTV is nearing the rollout of its medical and hospital services for the country’s marginalized poor.

Every year since 2004, UNTV’s public service initiatives come after another serving hundreds of thousands indigents. Its medical care services alone has benefitted more than 300,000 in 2012 alone, culled data from the station’s charity partner, Kamanggagawa Foundation revealed.

Besides his health care programs, Kuya Daniel also intensified UNTV’s life-saving and rescue efforts. This time The Public Service Channel is tapping taxi drivers as life-savers on the road.

Dubbed Rescue Cab: Tulong Muna Bago Pasada (Rescue Cab: Rescue First, Drive Later), the road-rescue mission is a younger sibling of Tulong Muna Bago Balita (Rescue First, Report Later) launched three years ago.

On their training last June, the first batch of cab driver trainees learned the skills on first-aid applications and rescue operations mainly for different cases of road accidents.