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A New Strategy on Health
Given the crucial importance of the health sector to the development and general well-being of the people, the prime minister s announcement last Tuesday that new drug and health policies will soon be introduced, comes as a highly positive indication of some badly needed activity to formulate a strategy with the announcement made, we now await the modalities through which the policies are to be formulated and. of course, the contents of the policies themselves.
Here, we would do well to remember that the health policy of former president Hussain Muhammad Ershad's government suffered from a number of serious deficiencies which made it unacceptable to the medical community as a whole and the doctors in particular. In the first instance, the objections dealt with the modality of policy formulation. The previous government followed a path well-trodden by itself on virtually every other issue. That is, the government used a small coterie of people, professionals as well as otherwise, to draw up the policy without ever bothering to consult the wider bodies of people directly involved, namely the doctors' associations and other medical bodies. This is not to say that Ershad's health policy did not contain anything of merit, because no such policy can ever be totally devoid of positive aspects.
However, due to the simple fact that inputs did not reflect the views and opinions of a cross section. the output naturally became the object of Intense suspicion and was therefore eventually ditched outright. We may recall that doctors went on strike over the health policy which is an indication of how strongly such a vital group of professionals felt about it.
The present government has the Invaluable benefit of hindsight and can be expected to avoid the folly of the past regime. To begin with, it has to acknowledge that certain decisions may have to be taken which would not be immediately attractive to the professionals in the field. But in order to avoid any misunderstanding and any repetition of the face-off that characterised Ershad's relations with the doctors. Prime Minister Khaleda Zia and Minister of Health Chowdhury Kamal Ibne Yusuf must make sure that there is a process of continuous consultation with the greatest number of people at every stage of the formulation of the health policy. The government should keep the interest of the people, meaning the endusers of the product of the policy, as the number one priority, and not that of any group interest.
For instance, if the government feels that professors and lecturers al government colleges should be barred from engaging in private practice, then it must convince the medical community of its necessity; likewise, if it thinks, in order to pul substance Into the slogan "Health For AH', that doctors on stale payroll ought to be given rural posting, then that too must De forcefully explained to medical associations.
For their part, the doctors are undoubtedly aware of the high regard in which they are held by the people. But such a position of esteem also tnrusls a great deal of moral responsibility on them. There is no escaping the fact that people do see the profession as an altruistic one. and expect doctors to put interests of patients above their own financial ones. Such a high expectation may well be unfair, but doctors ought to think seriously about what society expects of them and try to help the government in formulating a health policy that will be able to bring the benefits of medicine to the greatest number of people across the widest possible area.