The New Nation - Internet Edition

TRANSPARENCY International Bangladesh (TIB) in its latest annual report found the rate of corruption in some sectors declining a bit while it rose in other sectors. Individually, most corruption was noted in the education sector followed closely by the health sector. Thus, there is a very pressing need to cleanse this sector from ills. The vast numbers of the poor in this country are dependent on the public health sector. Its too shabby and sub-standard services are leaving no choices for the poor who cannot afford the costly private medical care.

The government in recent years has gone for expansionary activities in the public health sector. However, more important is devising an effective accountability system. A framework to make public health sector personnel accountable for what they do or do not do, has been felt for a long time. Doctors paid from the public purse remain absent, specially from the rural health complexes, and the spending of their energies and enthusiasm seem to be disproportionately higher on their private practices than at their government designated work places.

The administrations of public hospitals and health complexes are plagued by corruption that involve smuggling out of stores of medicines forcing their poor users to buy them back at prohibitive prices from the black market. From cleaning the premises to supplies of food to patients, everywhere in the public hospitals and rural health centres, the picture is one of pervasive corruption. Even valuable equipment from the hospitals are stolen or remain idle as they are not properly used. Therefore, a comprehensive accountability structure in the public health sector is needed. It should provide for penalties for dereliction of duty. Only then delivery in the public health sector can be expected to improve.