Let healthcare be affordable for all

What's the first thing that comes to your mind when you seek medical care? Is it the comfort of being cared for, or is it just the stress of the bill waiting for you at the end?
In Bangladesh, this is not a rhetorical question; it is a hard reality for millions. Nearly 74 per cent of health care expenditures come out-of-pocket which pushes an approximate 6.1 million to poverty every year. Meanwhile, only 2.5 per cent of the population is covered by any form of health insurance. Too many lives are lost everyday, not because the illnesses were incurable, but because the cost of the treatment was simply unaffordable.
This Universal Health Coverage Day (UHC) reminds us, in essence with this year's theme, that we must strive to make healthcare more affordable, accessible and humane for all. Because in a world where health is a right, why does accessing it feel like an unaffordable luxury?
The UHC is not just a policy vision; it is the promise of a Bangladesh where survival does not depend on one's wallet.

Mahadia Mutmainna Binte Ahmed
University of Dhaka
Institute of Health Economics
mutmainna2331@gmail.com