Doctors allowed locum practice

Heartless medical services

I refer to the letter by T.Y.K., “Exorbitant charges a shame to medical profession” (NST.March 23).

I agrees with him that exorbitant charges by doctors are wrong but he must not make such a generalized statement. The majority of doctors are humane and their charges are reasonable.Thereare many among us who forgo our fees for deserving patients.

I do not dispute that there are doctors who charge exorbitant rates, but can we fault them alone. The doctors in private practice are caught in a commercialized system of medical services.

The main culprit is in fact the government that has embarked on this rapid privatization of medical services.

Malaysia is a young developing country and it is the duty of the government to provide a reasonable quality of medical care to the citizens at an affordable fee. We should develop our standard of service to a satisfactory level before we can go private. We should do things at our own pace to suit our own needs, not follow blindly what the developed countries are doing.

The government should never have allowed the medical profession from being turned into a money-spinning profession. This has resulted in a brain drain from public to private sector and stagnation of skills in both.

The only way out now is to strengthen the public hospitals by attracting qualified specialists, retaining dedicated doctors and nurses, promotion based on merit and instilling ethics into service. Instead of rectifying the problem, the government, is in the process of creating a bigger mess by sanctioning locum practice.

After years of trying to improve the government medical services, suddenly an overnight decision to allow locum practice appears to solve all those problems. I just wonder whether our past leaders were that stupid as to have overlooked such a simplistic solution to a complex problem.

Dr.Chris Anthony