Too little for healthcare

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Managing Editor ANTONIETA B. LOPEZ Business Editor ODETTE MONTELIBANO Desk Editor MARY ANN BARCELONA Advertising Coordinator RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete

ANDRES R. LEONARDIA Managing Director

There is something very disturbing in the report that the amount being allotted to health care by the Department of Health in its budget is too little compared to its needs so it can operate efficiently and effectively. Computed at its minimum, the report claims that only a measly 33 centavos is being earmarked daily for the health needs of each Filipino.

Not all living citizens of this country avail of the provisions it has for the maintenance of the health and well-being of its people. Some can afford to meet their own expenses for medicines, hospital care and professional help. But these are not the majority of our people, they are not even a tenth of our population, perhaps.

Never in our recent and current times have we been faced with so many threats to our health and lives. There are ailments and diseases that strike with seasonal regularity, and there are others, more deadly and mysterious that have been brought to our shores by those coming from other lands. There are signs of epidemics, pandemics, and the surfacing of new and unfamiliar sickness that need a lot of research and study to counter to prevent.

All these require more funds and more skills to address, and these we sorely lack now, and are continuing to be deprived of.

There, too, is the alarming exodus of our medical professionals who have left, or are preparing to leave for the proverbial greener pastures because of the unattractiveness or lack of opportunities here. The ones opting to go abroad, to a man, claim that economic reasons are what led them to the decision to depart.

The confirmation that this government still is not "with it", or has not fully realized the seriousness of our medical and health problems, can be found is this report on the allocation to Health Care in the new budget. Shouldn't we raise a cry over this and conscript our congressmen and other officials to scrutinize these claims and promptly act on them?*