KUALA LUMPUR – The Finance Ministry’s proposed RM31.94 billion allocation for the Health Ministry has garnered mixed reactions from several stakeholders.
Following Finance Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz’s tabling of Budget 2021, Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Adham Baba said the increased allocation would help his ministry expand the public health sector.
“This is not merely a fight against Covid-19, but also relates to lifestyles practiced by the rakyat,” Dr Adham told a press conference in Parliament today.
He lauded the Finance Ministry for including programmes for mental health and substance abuse in the budget.
In a series of tweets, Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah thanked the government for its concern for the public health sector during the budget tabling.
“The RM90 million allocation for pneumococcal vaccines for 500,000 children under the National Immunisation Programme has been highly anticipated.”
KKM merakamkan setinggi-tinggi penghargaan di atas keprihatinan kerajaan melalui pembentangan Belanjawan 2021 sebentar tadi.
— Noor Hisham Abdullah (@DGHisham) November 6, 2020
Peruntukan RM90 juta utk vaksin pneumococcal kpd 500,000 kanak2 melalui Program Imunisasi Kebangsaan sememangnya sesuatu yang amat dinanti-nantikan pic.twitter.com/GRbI6TajQ2
However, former health minister Datuk Seri Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad appeared unimpressed by the budget, saying the Health Ministry was getting RM200 million less next year under Perikatan Nasional compared to this year’s allocation from Pakatan Harapan (PH).
On Twitter, Dzulkefly said although the ministry is seeing an increase of RM1.324 billion (4.12%) in Budget 2021 – from RM30.617 billion in 2020 to RM31.942 billion in 2021 – the deduction of emoluments and payments for contractual staff amounting to RM1.9 billion would mean that the “actual” allocation is at RM30 billion, versus the RM30.6 billion under PH.
Malaysian Society for Quality in Healthcare president Tan Sri Siti Sa’diah Sheikh Bakir called it a “comprehensive” budget, saying the fight against Covid-19 saw a sizable allocation.
“The appreciation and recognition of frontliners are also emphasised,” she told The Vibes.
She said health tourism was recognised as a “big revenue earner” after the Malaysia Healthcare Travel Council received an RM35 million allocation, and that the government’s efforts to procure Covid-19 vaccines were “laudable”.
“The focus on immunisation is noble and shows the government cares about its people.”
With much of the budget focused on tackling Covid-19 and its impact on the economy, Azrul Mohd Khalib, chief executive of the Galen Centre for Health and Social Policy, said the diversion of resources and cuts to fund the Covid-19 response threatened to have a significant negative impact response towards non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as cancer, kidney disease and cardiovascular diseases.
He said, for example, that it was “shocking” to see the allocation for cancer drastically reduced to RM136.4 million in 2021 from RM328.7 million in 2020.
“Even nephrology suffered a massive reduction. We cannot afford to look at one crisis at a time,” he said in a statement.
“Telling ourselves that we will deal with cancer and chronic kidney disease some other day after we are done with Covid-19 is not an option. Suffering could increase and lives will be lost due to insufficient resources for treatment and care.”
However, health advocate Dr Arvinder Singh HS, who echoed some of Azrul’s sentiments, said it was generally a “good” budget for NCDs.
“It’s welcomed. But I think more allocation or more thinking should be given to understanding whether patients are willing to come forward for things like cervical screenings and mammograms because these are culturally sensitive in Malaysia,” he said.
Arvinder lauded the special allocation for treatment, such as peritoneal dialysis, which he said was “a very good thing”.
“I’m happy they have a special allocation, but you have to take a step back and ask why there is a high demand for this,” he said.
“It is because many patients are presenting themselves to the hospitals at a very late stage where they need dialysis.”
Arvinder said such cases were either hypertensive or diabetes-related, or both and it was important to combat NCDs at an early stage before they led to severe complications like renal failure, strokes, or heart attacks “which take good quality of life away from a patient”.
“It will reduce life expectancy and increase mortality in these patients.
“It is a far bigger cry than just having an allocation for NCDs. It is about the way things are implemented. You can have a big reservoir of money to spend on NCDs, but if the programmes are not successfully implemented, it will all go to waste.” – The Vibes, November 6, 2020
