nationwide leafleting at government hospitals

taken from suaram penang mailing list, penang human rights link:

Dear friends,

Coalition against Privatisation of Health Care Services (Gabungan Membantah Penswastaan Perkhidmatan Kesihatan, GMPPK) will be organising a nationwide leafleting at government hospitals on 18 January.

This leafleting campaign is part of action to demand the government to make public the interimn report by Karl Karol, consultant on National Healthcara financing scheme. The leafleting exercise will also warn the public regarding the devastating suggestion in the interimn report which will further erode our public healthcare system, including introduction of GST, corporatisation of government hospitals, and gatekeeper system.

For leafleting in Penang, we will be gather at Penang Hospital on 18 January (Thursday), 10 am, at the main lobby.

We are looking forward to your participation in this action.

For more enquiries, please contact Dr Kumar 019-5616807, or for those would like to participate in the leafleting in Penang, please contact Chon Kai at 019-5669518.

Regards,
Chon Kai

Suara Rakyat Malaysia (SUARAM )
Penang Branch
85, Lrg Pekaka 5,
Tmn Desa Baru,
11700 Gelugor,
Penang.
Tel / Fax: 04-6582285
E-mail: suarampg@… / suarampg@…

i’ll be there at the general hospital tomorrow at 10.00am. yes i know it is working time… well consider this as part of my work. haha. true in a way. the penang office for human development (POHD) is part of this coalition and its officer, joachim had invited me, as his colleague and other colleagues too, to help in the distribution.

if you are free at 10.00am tomorrow, do come and join us. we must made people aware that we do not want the corporatisation of government hospitals hospital. we do not health care service to be privatised. just imagine how much more you would have to spend if health care is privatised.

i have a friend who not too long ago went for a very minor surgery at the government hospital and she paid only i think either RM10 or RM20, and she received lots of medicine all for RM5.00 only. she had been told that those kind of medicines if she were to get from private hospitals/clinics it would cost her over RM100!! she had been quite a regular out-patient to the government clinic, each time taking some medication home. she is so grateful to the government clinic for the cheap medicine that she promised if she did strike the first prize in the lottery, she would donate a substantial amount to the government clinic!

well then, i told her, she had better pray that government health care services won’t be privatised if she wants to continue receiving cheap health care.

this talk of privitisation of healtcare services had been going on as early as beginning of 2005, i think. in june 2005 i had attended a talk on ‘health and healthcare for all malaysians’ where the speakers talked on privitisation of healthcare services and the proposed insurance scheme by the government. well up to now, the good news is that there is no mention of the insurance scheme.

the distribution of leaflets tomorrow at all government hospitals will be nation-wide affair. in penang, we’ll do it at the general hospital at residency road (which is btw, just a few blocks round the corner away from my office).

well, remember if you are free tomorrow at 10.00am do come and join us at the general hospital, penang.