This is wrong! Plain wrong!

Oct 14, 2024 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – The recent announcement of a $200,000 cash grant per household has generated waves of excitement. But in the shadows of this populist spectacle, another measure quietly slipped past the public’s scrutiny.

It is the government’s plan to introduce a universal healthcare voucher of $10,000 per child, set to roll out next year. On the surface, this policy may appear as a benevolent gesture, a part of the government’s effort to address the healthcare needs of some 500,000 children.

But in reality, it is a thinly veiled maneuver that will cost taxpayers a staggering $5 billion and represents an audacious contradiction to the government’s self-proclaimed mission of building up public healthcare. This is no mere policy tweak; it is a calculated transfer from the public purse to profit-seeking private healthcare providers—a move that should outrage any citizen concerned with the integrity of public services.

In his address to parliament, the President announced that some $60 billion has been earmarked for cash grants, a direct transfer to households. Yet the healthcare voucher, though more subtle, represents a different kind of transfer—a siphoning of public funds into the coffers of the private healthcare sector. The puzzling question arises: why would a government, committed to the expansion of public healthcare, offer these vouchers when public hospitals and clinics already provide free healthcare services, including diagnostic tests? Why introduce a voucher that can only be redeemed at private healthcare facilities?

The answers to these questions lie buried beneath layers of rhetoric. If a child can walk into a public hospital and receive these same tests without cost, then the issuance of a $10,000 voucher could only be for private healthcare use.

Is this a backdoor subsidy to private clinics and hospitals? This cannot be about empowering families to seek better care; it is about redirecting taxpayer money to for-profit entities. It is a deliberate effort to boost the revenues of private healthcare providers at the expense of a robust and accessible public system. And what a generous boost it is—$5 billion worth of taxpayers’ money, a sum that could instead have been used to enhance diagnostic capabilities at public hospitals, making such tests more accessible and efficient for all citizens.

But more troubling than the financial gymnastics is the contradiction inherent in this policy. Only months ago, the government paraded its grand vision of a modernized public healthcare system. The plans were ambitious: constructing 12 new hospitals, upgrading regional health centers, and expanding the suite of diagnostic services offered at public facilities. These initiatives, we were told, were meant to strengthen the public healthcare infrastructure, to ensure that all citizens—regardless of income—could access quality care. The promise was one of transformation: a network of public hospitals and clinics that would reduce reliance on private providers, making essential medical services universally accessible without a price tag.

Yet now, with the stroke of a pen, the universal healthcare voucher program undercuts that very vision. This is not a policy that empowers public hospitals, nor does it reduce the burden on families seeking care. It does the opposite, channeling money into a parallel system where private facilities will reap the rewards of public largesse. This is not merely an inconsistency; it is a betrayal of the government’s own stated priorities. The very act of offering a voucher that can be used outside of the public system sends a clear message: the government’s investment in public healthcare may be grand in rhetoric, but it lacks the conviction of true reform.

It is worth examining the necessity—or rather, the lack thereof—of the tests that these vouchers will fund. A battery of basic diagnostic tests for children is proposed, yet the majority of children, likely over 90%, will pass these tests without issue. Only a small fraction—perhaps 10% at most—will exhibit any concerning results. This means that the majority of the tests will serve no urgent medical purpose; they are, in effect, unnecessary. They represent a pretext, a contrivance to justify the outlay of funds that will ultimately enrich private clinics.

A more efficient approach would have been to enhance screening capabilities within public hospitals, using existing resources more judiciously and reserving private sector engagement for truly specialized cases. Instead, the voucher scheme pushes all children into private facilities, ensuring that $5 billion is funneled into the hands of those already profiting from the weaknesses of the public system.

The irony of this approach is bitter. If the government truly believed in the efficacy of the public system it is building, it would be touting those 12 new hospitals as the solution. It would be bolstering the capacity of public clinics to handle a wider range of diagnostic tests. It would be expanding free services, not quietly subsidizing private ones. Instead, this voucher program suggests that the government has more faith in private providers than in its own institutions. This should be a source of indignation for every citizen who has been told that public healthcare is a priority.

The idea that $5 billion of taxpayer money is being funneled into private healthcare is an abomination. It raises critical questions about who benefits from such decisions and whether the public interest is truly being served. Are these vouchers a clever way to provide children with better care, or are they simply a windfall for private clinics? It is a question of priorities—of whether public funds are best used to support a healthcare system that serves all citizens equitably, or whether they should be used to pad the profits of private entities that cater to those who can afford more.

This is why citizens should be alarmed, and why they should speak out against this policy. It is not merely a benign policy choice; it is a reflection of a broader trend where public services are allowed to wither while private interests are allowed to flourish on the backs of public money. It is a signal that even as the government professes a commitment to building new hospitals, it is quietly shifting resources away from the public system and into private hands. It is a form of creeping privatization, and it should be resisted at every turn.

(This is wrong! Plain wrong!)

 

 

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• building, children, clinics, enrich, Private, surface

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