KARACHI, Feb 3: Federal Health Minister Aijaz Hussain Jakhrani said on Tuesday that the government would soon introduce regulations to eliminate the exploitation of doctors and patients by private concerns in the health sector.
He said the government wanted the private sector to take into account the budgetary constraints of patients when delivering health services or products.
The minister was speaking to newsmen at a press briefing held after his meeting with the central and Karachi chapter office-bearers of the Pakistan Medical Association at the PMA house.
Provincial health minister Dr Sagheer Ahmad was also present on the occasion.
Minister Jakhrani said the government would be working towards implementing legislation that would control the prices of products provided by private companies in the health sector. He said that he had been told that private health sector companies often charged patients high rates for medicine and also paid their doctors and paramedical staff low salaries.
He said that a new health policy was being prepared and would be finalised by the federal health ministry in March.
Minister Jakhrani said that the government wanted standard medicines to be supplied in markets and that was why it was cracking down on counterfeit drug manufacturers and promoters. He added that a system of regulation and registration was required for providers of ayurvedic and herbal products, as there was little knowledge available as to how these products actually worked.
Responding to a question, the minister said that though the health ministry had allowed increases in the prices of some medicines recently, it did not intend to allow any ‘across-the-board’ increase in the prices of drugs. He said a sub-committee, under the leadership of MNA Dr Azra Fazal Pachecho, had been formed to examine “hardship cases” and allow changes in the existing prices of pharmaceutical products as required.
He said issues such as primary health care, maternal, neonatal and child health, hepatitis, health budget allocations (and their utilisation), ‘quackery’, routine immunisation and provision of other vaccines and the improvement of government health facilities would also be addressed in the forthcoming health policy.
Responding to another question, the federal minister said that he would ask his ministry to move the court to vacate a status quo order to ensure that the elected representative of doctors from Sindh could sit in the next meeting of the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council.
The minister described his talks with the representatives of the PMA as beneficial and said the federal health ministry would remain in contact with them.
Earlier, the PMA group, comprising Dr Habibur Rehman Soomro, Dr Aziz Khan Tank, Dr Samrina Hashmi, Dr Tipu Sultan, Dr Umar Farooq, Dr Nighat Shah, Dr Qaiser Sajjad, Dr Shershah and others told the minister that health was a fundamental right of the people and it must be recognised that providing healthcare to people was the prime responsibility of the state.
The PMA proposed an increase in the national budget for health to a substantial six per cent of the GDP, an increase in the salaries of doctors and improvements in their working conditions in the private sector. They also called for legislation to ban all advertisements in the electronic and print media which said products could cure diseases, and also of advertisements containing publicity for doctors, hakims, ayervedics and homeopaths. The doctors called for an effective ban on quackery and a ban on the over-the-counter sale of drugs without prescriptions from qualified doctors.
The PMA group also demanded a complete review of the government’s drug policy and asked the government to ensure that an autonomous drug regulatory authority was established, and that commonly used drugs were available easily and at reasonable prices. There should be rules and regulations for private hospitals, clinics and laboratories as well, it added.
The government should also ensure that the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council worked as an autonomous, independent and democratically elected body having equal representation from all stakeholders, the doctors said.
Provincial health minister Dr Sagheer Ahmad, meanwhile, told newsmen that the health department had recently asked EDOs and district Nazims in Sindh to report the presence of illegal blood banks in their jurisdiction.
He agreed with a questioner in saying that the presence of ‘quack’ doctors represented a menace, and said this could be countered through the strict implementation of legislation proposed by the government. The presence of qualified doctors at health facilities also helped to reduce the number of people resorting to using so-called healers and ‘quacks’, he said.
He said that an increase in the budget for health services was necessary, as it was difficult for the health department to ensure the free-of-cost provision of all sorts of medicines, services and clinical test facilities to patients throughout the entire year due to resource constraints.