flip flop (again) from the gov’t

first they gave the nod for sime darby to take over national heart institute (IJN) then they hit the pause button. flip-flop. according to malaysiakini, many quarters had expressed thier opposition to the takeover from sime darby, that’s why the government put on hold the takeover. why didn’t the government think of other people’s opinion first, seek their opinion first before coming to a decision? they didn’t and thus the flip-flopping. doesn’t look good at all on the government.

if you take a look at malaysiakini or surf around, you would have noticed there had been lots of talk on this issue – in the letter columns and from blogs. all of course oppose the privatization of IJN. one interesting post i found is some revelation of the DPM’s intention to sell IJN from blogger, another brick in the wall. hmm…. so was that why the DPM was so fast in announcing the takeover of IJN by sime darby? he didn’t anticipate the strong opposition from so many sides! now he has to hit the pause button…. and i hope to god IJN will not ever be privatized.

the biggest fear of all if IJN is privatized is of course that the fees will be high and many patients, most of them from lower income group, would not afford it. though we had the assurance of DPM and sime darby they would not raise the fees, who in the world would believe them? privatization, always, inevitably, will end up with higher fees!

at one time somewhere end 2006 and beginning 2007, there were also some talk of privatizing government healthcare. as usual, there were a lot of protests from NGO here and there. i remember i joined suaram penang to protest too by distributing flyers in the general hospital. the heading of that post of mine said ‘affordable health is important’. yes indeed. healthcare is very important and it should be affordable to all, especially the lower income group. now just imagine, heart transplant or heart surgery is very important (a matter of life and death!) and if IJN is privatized, they wouldn’t afford it – and what will happen to them? so it is very important that IJN should not be privatized at all!