EDITORIAL - Investing in public health

Being poor is tough, and being sick when you’re poor is even tougher. Welfare agencies may be able to subsidize food, clothing and shelter, but quality health care costs a fortune. Heart bypass surgery and angioplasty are out of the question; indigents suffering from blocked coronary arteries will just have to wait for their hearts to give up. Even those suffering from tuberculosis need cash if they want to get well. Government health centers are so strapped for cash that patients have to buy their own medicines and pay laboratory and other service fees.

Now the Department of Health is warning that some of the biggest government hospitals may have to shut down by yearend for lack of funds. Reports said those likely to be affected include the San Lazaro Hospital and the Jose R. Reyes Memorial Medical Center, both in the city of Manila.

Health officials issued the warning not only because of reports that the DOH budget for 2003 could be P575 million less than this year’s appropriation, but mainly because of delays in the release of the department’s budget for 2002.

You only have to drop by one of the DOH-retained hospitals to recognize the acute lack of funds for public health care. There are simply too many patients and too few health workers, many of whom complain of being underpaid. Free wards are filled to capacity. Naturally you can’t expect state-of-the-art medical equipment in such hospitals. The government can’t even pay enough people to keep the hospitals clean.

Quality health care is expensive anywhere in the world, and the capability of developing countries including the Philippines to provide public health care is generally inadequate. Yet the government cannot afford to give low priority to this most basic of human needs. Health, it has often been said, is wealth. A healthy person is a productive person. Keeping the people healthy is an investment that the government must make.