In every country, society has certain needs and limitations. In Pakistan, healthcare services are either in poor condition or are not affordable by the masses and it gives rise to many questions like, why private hospitals should be established? Why the government is unable to provide proper health facilities to the masses? Why private hospitals are infamous for the exorbitant charges of healthcare services? There are a lot of questions that can be raised here to highlight the causes of the exploitation of the general public.
As a matter of fact, and keeping in view the welfare of the people at large, two sectors cannot be left at the mercy of the private sector. The sectors include Education and Health. Both of these sectors are based on the tenets on which a society is established and develops.
In Pakistan, there are three types of education systems and the destructive results of this division are hidden to none. The same is the case with the health system. There are many categories of hospitals in the private sector which are charging fees on different terms limitlessly. As a result, the poor and middle class is quite helpless. There are thousands of poor people in Pakistan who die just because they cannot afford the proper treatment in private hospitals.
As far as the conditions of public sectors’ hospitals are concerned, it is worsening day by day. The charges in terms of doctors’ fees, ward charges, laboratory tests, etc. are though affordable to the common people yet it requires approach and links to get admitted and getting tests in public hospitals is impossible in itself. If the patient gets admitted to the government hospital, the treatment, he gets is quite unsatisfactory. OPD in the public sectors’ hospitals seems to be flooded with the masses. It becomes nearly impossible for a medical officer to treat hundreds of patients in limited hours.
Moreover, the medicines which are supposed to be available in the drug store of the hospitals are usually out of stock. As a result, the patients go back to the home in the same physical and mental condition with which they had arrived at the hospitals.
The doctor’s fee in private hospitals ranges from Rs. 1,000 to 5,000 and their private clinics in it much higher because no one checks them. Operation and surgery charges range from Rs. 50,000 to 150,000. Bed charges range from Rs. 8,000/day to Rs. 15,000/day. The nebulization charges are between Rs. 50 to Rs. 1100. The Echo Cardiograph charges are Rs. 2,000 to 6,350. The Gastroscopy charges are between Rs. 7,500 and 45,900. The Abdomen and Pelvis TVS Charges are Rs. 1200 to Rs. 3500.
These are just the exorbitant charges of a few procedures in private hospitals. One can imagine how a poor patient will afford it. This is the need for the time that the conditions and attitudes of the public sectors’ hospital be improved to a great extent. It will not be irrelevant to mention here that all the expensive equipment is available in the government hospitals but either these equipment are out of order or being underused.
Image source link
