Sabah health services limping along

By Michael Kaung
May 15, 2011 | Free Malaysia Today

KOTA KINABALU: Sabah DAP said that it has received scores of complaints regarding the services rendered by the Federal Health Ministry to Sabahans in terms of quality of treatment, medical supplies and equipment.

Junz Wong, state DAP assistant secretary, said that both the patients and doctors are unhappy and frustrated with the state of affairs in the medical and health services.

The party believes that Sabahans are among the most ill-cared for citizens in Malaysia due to lack of drugs and healthcare equipment.

Wong justifies his claim by pointing out that Sabah only one radiotherapy machine for the whole state.

In the past, before the Sabah Medical Centre (SMC) was bought over by government, the hospital rented the radiotherapy machine.

Now after taking over the SMC hospital, the government is still renting it.

In this regard, Wong contended Sabah is being short-changed by the federal government as far as the health services is concerned.

He accused the Health Ministry of not allocating funds to buy a new up-to-date radiotherapy machine for the cancer patients in the state.

“Now that the equipment is old and overworked all the time, it breaks down almost every three months. There is no back up machine. The nearest radiotherapy machine available for cancer patients in the state is located in Kuching, Sarawak.”

Wong said that lack of equipments has led to many specialists to look for better working conditions elsewhere.

“Our foreign-trained local specialists are keen to serve but the poor medical infrastructure, especially (lack of) equipment makes it impossible for them to provide optimum service.

“They are just ticked off by the remarks of inadequate funds and of the government’s emphasis on new buildings.”

Wong said he knows of the case of a cancer specialist who returned to Sabah after 18 years in the United Kingdom but was disappointed that after 48 years the Sabah Medical and Health Service Department does not have the environment, system and infrastructure to employ people like him for long.

Wong added that Sabah deserves better treatment from the federal government in view of the massive contribution of wealth to the national coffers by the state but in return only received less than 10% of the overall national budget.

“To illustrate the poor treatment and disparity further, Putrajaya hospital in Kuala Lumpur has three radiotherapy machines and it is not even a state,” Wong added.