Govt ready with free health services for the needy

JAKARTA (JP): After less than a year's try-out, the Ministry of Health yesterday announced it is ready to provide free health services to the 25.9 million poor people nation-wide.

Minister of Health Sujudi said in a press conference yesterday the distribution of health cards, which entitle a family to free medical services at all community health centers and government- owned hospitals, is one of the programs marking the 30th National Health Day which falls next Saturday Nov. 12.

"We have the facilities, human resources and budget to provide free medical services for people living below the poverty line. Local governments across the country have also declared they are ready to start the program, so why not start now?" he asserted.

Evaluations of the try-out, which started last April, were initially planned for one year.

Sujudi, who was accompanied by Secretary General Hidayat Hardjoprawito, said the acceleration of the program was not a part of the government's campaign to win the 1997 election.

"We just can't wait any longer because there are so many poor people," he stressed.

Health cards, which will be distributed free of charge to families categorized as "pre-welfare", are printed with the help of contributions from the private sector, the ministry's cooperative and state firms overseen by the ministry of health.

No photograph is necessary for the health cards, which will only bear the signature of the head of the family and head of the village. "This is to minimize as much as possible the need to spend money and go through complicated bureaucratic procedures," Sujudi said.

"There is a Rp 408,000 budget for each poverty-stricken village and Rp 297 per person from the Presidential Aid Program for Poor Villages," Sujudi said.

Cumbersome

Poor people are already entitled to free medical services but procedures under the current plan are so cumbersome that most people simply waive their rights. Under the current plan people who cannot afford to pay medical costs, can declare themselves so, reporting to the neighborhood and community associations and all the way to the district office.

A popular joke about the current plan, sarcastically told by poor people, is that by the time they got final approval, they would be dead.

The new health card system bypasses all the red tape.

The minister explained this year's commemoration of National Health Day will place emphasis on the quality of physical, mental and social health of human resources.