THE condition of most public hospitals in the capital Dhaka and all over the country is far from satisfactory and at most places dilapidated and none but the health ministry officials and physicians are responsible for it. Corruption, misuse and misappropriation of budgetary funds and swindling of resources are draining the resources of public hospitals at an unabated pace. There is an acute shortage of beds for patients, scarcity of medicine, lack of maintenance of equipment and such other drawbacks. Physicians and nurses are often absent from their work places. Lower grade employees and brokers are active to lure patients away from public hospital doors to private hospitals. Police are regular accomplice to such irregularities.
This dismal picture was painted at a discussion in the city on Sunday based on a World Bank (WB) survey on 50 public hospitals in Dhaka, Khulna and Sylhet divisions. The WB findings showed that more than half of the equipment in these hospitals are not functioning and mostly left unused and underutilized. Moreover, 11 percent of the equipment is damaged, 11 percent is functional but unutilized, 10 percent is partially in service, 21 percent boxes are yet to be unpacked. Only 37 percent is being used. Health experts largely blamed physicians for the dismal condition of these hospitals
as most of them are attached to private hospitals and clinics and refer patients to those places instead of treating them in government run hospitals. They even use brokers to bring patients to private hospitals and clinics. This is how the physicians are exploiting patients in the name of treatment causing them to spend huge amounts money at private facilities. On the other hand their neglect of public hospitals where they have their postings has left most of them unattended by physicians and the facilities left unutilized or underutilized.
We commend the WB study as it will let people know how the public hospitals misuse its annual loans and other donations for modernization and upgrades for their service quality. News reports said annual procurement of equipment and other logistics for public hospital is being routinely carried out to facilitate contractors to buy these things to financially benefit senior health department officials and hospital management bosses. Buying of medicine also serves the purpose of vested interest quarters, not that of patients. Their procurement prices vary several times on each item every year showing how these vested interest groups are exploiting the public hospital facilities to get illegal wealth. Even most hospitals at Upazila levels don’t know their annual buying list and when they get the equipment that they don’t need, they leave the package unattended.
We hold the view that any procurement of equipment for public hospital facilities must be done keeping in view the nature of these hospitals and the need of their patients. Moreover, it must be done on requisition of the hospitals concerned, not pushed by the department bosses to serve the interest of contractors and benefit themselves personally from such buying. We hope that the WB study may alert the agency on the massive corruptions and irregularities to take steps to stop it.
