Reforms essential in the health sector
It is expected
that healthcare systems serve the population with efficient and transparent mechanisms guaranteeing universal
medical access
Even after 45 years of being an independent country Bangladesh lacks in providing access to quality healthcare to a huge chunk of its population and the severity of the situation increases as one delves deeper into remote areas. In such a situation, reforms and efforts to provide healthcare in rural areas become a welcome move.
It must be admitted that in the last few decades Bangladeshs health sector has outperformed neighbouring countries in delivering positive outcomes in spite of limited resources. Life expectancy has grown to 71 years partly as a result of infant mortality being more than halved since 1990 and maternal mortality reducing by 75 per cent in the same time frame. Much of the achievement made in improving the survival rate of infants and children under the age of five and expanding immunisation coverage can be attributed to successive governments following a flexible, pragmatic approach to improving service delivery. However there is hardly any room for complacency.
It is expected that healthcare systems serve the population with efficient and transparent mechanisms guaranteeing universal medical access. This mandate does not always hold for Bangladeshs health sector that is beset with challenges spanning decades of neglect..
Recently the Bangladesh Health Facility Survey found that, only around 25 per cent of our health facilities have some basic equipment, like stethoscope, thermometer, blood pressure apparatus, adult weighing scale, child or infant weighing scale. It is difficult to believe that public hospitals, which are allocated huge fund by the government every year are not in a position to buy small items like thermometer or weighing machine?
One of the most critical challenges faced by the health sector of Bangladesh is in the arena of human resources for Health. Bangladesh has approximately 60,000 doctors and a deficit of almost 140,000 nurses. Moreover, the nurse-physician ratio in Bangladesh is one of the worst in the world.
We have observed that every profession has become commercialized and the health care sector is no exception. It is well known that the conditions of almost all government hospitals is really appalling, with the routine issues like unhygienic environment, unavailability of doctors, poor system of attending emergency cases of accidents and serious injuries. In private hospitals, we find proper infrastructure and proper health care facilities but they charge huge amount for the treatment. Some say that in private hospitals the authorities are just looting the poor patients by all means in the form of heavy consultancy fee, tests and medicines, The government should step forward to take immediate action and take note of the private hospitals running only on commercial lines. The real remedy lies in accepting the constitutional obligation that it is the responsibility of the state to provide education and quality healthcare to the masses.
