KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 29 — The onus is on state governments to provide a subsidised health care plan as the Ministry of Health (MoH) has already done enough, according to the Malaysian Medical Association (MMA).
This follows the suggestion of Medical Practitioners Coalition Association of Malaysia that the Ministry of Health and other state governments should emulate the Selangor state government’s Peduli Sihat scheme, which provides subsidised healthcare to the poor.
Its president President Dr Ravindran R. Naidu said that the MoH has already been tasked with facilitating public healthcare, and that the task of promoting and cementing public and private partnership depends on each individual state government.
‘‘As the administrator and providers of public healthcare, MOH have done enough. It is now upon other state government to study and implement such schemes,’’ he said.
Dr Ravindran added that MMA doctors who are participating in the scheme are happy as they are able to provide healthcare to the Bottom 40(B40).
“This is because we are providing those who are in the B40 an option for affordable health care,’’ he said.
The programme which sees private clinics providing a service to the people of Selangor and subsidised by the state government was praised by Dr Ravindran as dependable.
“The (Selangor) state government are excellent paymasters as they would pay to participate clinics every two weeks Essentially they are third-party administrators and an are excellent paymasters.
The programme is also important to reduce congestion in public healthcare facilities, said Dr Ravindran.
“Especially with the current economic situation, more and more people are switching to public healthcare. The scheme helped to reduce wait times in these facilities,’’ he said.
