Govt to introduce heath card for the poor: Nasim

Minister for Health and Family Welfare Affairs Mohammad Nasim said Friday the government would introduce health card system to ensure medical services for the poor patients, reports BSS.

"The government will give health cards so that the poor patients get improved services in well-known hospitals and clinics," Nasim said this while speaking at an international scientific conference organised by Bangladesh Association of Cardiac Vascular and Thoracic Surgeons at a city hotel Friday.

Shipping Minister Shahjahan Khan, National Professor Brig Gen (retd) Dr Abdul Malik, Bangladesh Association of Cardiac Vascular and Thoracic Surgeons Vice-President Dr Faruque Ahmed and Prof Dr Habib-e Millat, MP, addressed the seminar while Bangladesh Association of Cardiac Vascular and Thoracic Surgeons president Dr Jahangir Kabir presided over it.

Mr Nasim said the poor people hardly avail of health services at private hospitals and clinics.

"It is very sad. Only the rich can afford costly treatment in private hospitals and clinics," he said, adding that the government is taking steps so that the poor people are not deprived of improved treatment in private hospitals and clinics.

The health minister urged the authorities of well-known hospitals and clinics to come forward to deliver health services to the poor people and suggested them to give free treatment at least once a week.

Referring to the problems of rural people, he said the physicians would have to be motivated to go to villages and serve the rural people.

He said the government would recruit 6,000 doctors in next one month. These doctors would work in their respective districts. Arrangements would be made to provide the doctors with cars, if they work in villages, he added.

The minister also said that a doctor would get a good posting after serving in the rural areas for three years.