Getting funds for healthcare

I AGREE with the letter “Appeal to Minister of Health” ( The Star, Aug 27) on the need for an entire overhaul and total revamp of the public healthcare system.

I have visited a few public hospitals of late and I believe the Health Minister may have gone to ground zero ( turun padang) to check on them. If he hasn’t visited those under the Education Ministry, I would like to suggest that he does so.

This is because then he will see the bigger and holistic picture of the public hospitals and look for things like economies of scale, improvement of standard operating procedures, funding and priority of budget to bring about a better delivery of public healthcare.

The major grouse that I have noted is the lack of funding for a better healthcare system. Budgets were slashed previously and to get back on track now requires a bigger budget but the government has financial constraints.

I have seen beautiful paintings on the walls of public hospitals. Could we use this space instead for advertisements from companies or corporations who are in the ‘healthy lifestyle’ business and perhaps protection of the environment to draw some income? Companies or corporations have big budgets for sales and marketing. If not, they can draw from their corporate social responsibility budget to fund a worthy cause.

Promoting a healthy lifestyle could be in the form of exercise equipment, gadgets, attire, shoes, fitness gyms or clubs.

Extending it to the care of the elderly, it could be in the form of adult diapers, gloves, wheelchairs, standing frames or meters for measuring blood pressure.

Those who visit the hospitals are not only the sick but also people who accompany them or those visiting patients.

However, I wouldn’t suggest any food or supplement product advertisement as drawing from my own personal experience, what is good for someone may actually be bad for another person based on their different allergies and illness, for example.

I hope the Health Ministry will consider my suggestion to get more funds to improve public healthcare.