CONSUMER CONCERNS…SPECIALTY HOSPITALS ARE INEVITABLE

Sep 04, 2016 News

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PAT  DIAL

Two weeks ago, on 16th August, Government took the formal decision to cancel the Specialty Hospital Project and to ask the donor, the Indian Government, to instead expend the remaining US$14 million on modernizing the primary health care facilities at the West Demerara, Suddie and Bartica hospitals.
This decision to cancel the Specialty Hospital Project has brought some certainty to this affair which oscillated between doing the Project and not doing it, or using the Indian funds for primary health care or even for a pediatric hospital.  Such indecision is very unusual in Aid Projects and the donor must have felt a sense of relief with the advent of certainty.
The Consumer Community did welcome the ending of the suspended animation in which the Project had been for nearly three years, but deeply regretted that Guyana will have to again wait for some time before the inevitable establishment of a Specialty Hospital.  Its inevitability rests on the fact that Guyana needs such a hospital, and which will also put Guyana in the league of all progressive countries where there is at least one Specialty Hospital.
Many are of the opinion that the late President Burnham would not have died the way he did if he was in a Specialty Hospital.  Older citizens and those in declining health were looking forward to the establishment of the Hospital, since most such people do not have the funds to travel abroad and pay for necessary foreign specialist treatment.  In contrast, many wealthy persons and governmental personnel who could access public funds for their foreign medical treatment have had long leases of life and even restoration of health.
The consumer community has long supported the establishment of at least one Specialty Hospital in Guyana under Government auspices and our reasons for so doing are:
Firstly, as indicated above, those who do not have the necessary funds or expatriate familial support would not be able to have Specialist medical treatment abroad and may have their lives shortened or may see their health steadily deteriorating.  In addition, a Specialty Hospital would be able to deal with sudden emergency conditions.  In Cuba, for example, because of their Specialty hospitals, numerous citizens would have been rendered life-saving emergency attention, and this is probably one of the reasons for the longevity of their politicians.
Secondly, a Specialty Hospital would be introducing to Guyana the cutting edge of Medicine and would introduce advanced procedures, equipment and treatment way beyond primary health care.  It would also bring to the Guyanese medical profession a corpus of top-grade specialists in various fields who would be able to pass on their skills to our younger doctors and could also be of help in raising the standard of the Medical School of the University of Guyana.
Thirdly, there are more Guyanese living abroad than resident in Guyana.  Many thousands of these expatriates who have reached retiring age would desire to resettle in the land of their birth bringing with them their foreign pensions and other accumulations of wealth, but they cannot come because the specialist health care they normally enjoy in the Developed Countries is absent in Guyana.  The immense social importance of the ingathering of our people and the reunification of families and the injection of foreign exchange into the economy from their resettlement, could not be measured.
Fourthly, having world-class medical care available in any country is an attraction to visitors.  In the case of Guyana, availability of specialist medical care is of particular importance to its tourism industry which is very different from the sun-and-sand offerings of the Caribbean islands.  Guyana’s tourism product is the flora and fauna of our vast forests, the magnificent landscapes such as our waterfalls and our historical background including our unique architecture.  The tourists who would be attracted by Guyana’s tourism product would tend to be middle-aged or older people who would feel there is no risk in visiting once specialist health care is available.  Specialist Hospitals are therefore linked with Guyana’s Tourist Industry.
Fifthly, Specialty Hospitals in Developing Countries attract patients from Developed Countries because they offer the same treatment and procedures of the Developed Countries at lower costs.  India, for example, earns millions of dollars from its medical tourism industry by attracting patients mostly from Europe and North America.
A Specialty Hospital in Guyana would immediately attract patients from the Guyanese Diaspora in Europe and North America, and would be an immediate earner of foreign exchange.  And since Guyana has certain advantages over other countries such as its being English-speaking and its geographical location being easy to reach, Guyana could develop a very vibrant medical tourism industry.
A Specialty Hospital could be the forerunner of others as a Medical Tourism Industry develops.  But the State should not abdicate being the main owners of such hospitals and should not leave their development wholly to private companies and individuals.

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