Healthcare privatisation causing spike in asian child deaths

[Hamel]

Yahoo news

BANGKOK (AFP) - The rising cost of privatised healthcare in Asia is behind a spike in child deaths in Cambodia and caused more than half the region to fall behind global goals to lower child mortality, a United Nations (news - web sites) report warned.

Cambodia, where one in seven children die before the age of five, is the only country in the region where child mortality had risen since 1990, but others lag well behind death reduction goals set by the UN, the organisation's children fund (UNICEF (news - web sites)) said.

After Cambodia, the fund's 'Progress for Children' report revealed that North Korea (news - web sites), Myanmar, Pacific island nations and Papua New Guinea fared the worst in the Asia-Pacific region, reporting little or no reduction in under-five mortality since 1990.

The transition from planned to market economies in many Asian nations was behind much of the problem with free state health services giving way to often costly private clinics, according to the fund.

"Poor people are often unable to pay for those services and stop bringing children for treatment until the very last moment," UNICEF Regional Health and Nutrition adviser Dr Steve Atwood told AFP. "Vaccinations are also a major concern."

He said where fees have been introduced for treatment, immunisation rates had fallen. High childbirth mortality rates, representing 45 percent of all under-five deaths, and poor sanitation in many nations added to the problem.

After childbirth, diarrhoea was the second largest killer of under-fives at 17 percent followed by acute respiratory infections at 16 percent.

Malnutrition was a contributory factor in more than half of all deaths, said UNICEF, warning that in some parts of Asia, malnutrition rates were almost comparable to sub-Saharan Africa.

The fund said the current slowdown meant that only 13 of 27 countries in the region, for which figures were available, would meet the UN's Millennium Development Goals, but said some countries, such as Malaysia, had bucked the trend.

In 1990 Malaysia had a child mortality rate of 21; in 2002 it was recorded at eight, putting it just behind its target of seven deaths for every 1,000 live births. Brunei, South Korea (news - web sites) and Singapore also performed well, according to UNICEF.

"The success of these countries has been due not only to their relative economic prosperity but also enlightened leadership and the political will to invest in providing basic healthcare for all citizens," said Atwood.

UNICEF said Asia's overall child mortality figure has dropped by more than 75 percent since 1960, but that rates had dropped by less than two percent annually over the last decade, compared to five percent throughout the 1960s and 1970s.

To meet the UN's goals, which all member nations have agreed to, countries must achieve a two-thirds reduction in their 1990 under-five child mortality figures by 2015. This requires an average annual improvement of roughly 4.4 per cent.

So fuck em if they can't afford it? It's their lack of personal responsibility? Socialism is bad lol?

[PainRack]

I don't really know what your point is, but if its about universal healthcare like that of Australia and Britain, you're not going to win brownie points when only Brunei has a universal healthcare system, and Singapore, South Korea and Japan has the region highest costs in healthcare.

Using nations like Cambodia, Papua New Guinea, which have poor access to quality healthcare just seems to be playing with statistics to prove a point.

[AniThyng]

I don't really know what your point is, but if its about universal healthcare like that of Australia and Britain, you're not going to win brownie points when only Brunei has a universal healthcare system, and Singapore, South Korea and Japan has the region highest costs in healthcare.

Using nations like Cambodia, Papua New Guinea, which have poor access to quality healthcare just seems to be playing with statistics to prove a point.

The transition from planned to market economies in many Asian nations was behind much of the problem with free state health services giving way to often costly private clinics, according to the fund.

i think the point is that in places where people have no access to basic healthcare due to costs and lack of government provision for them (aka socialism) deaths inevitably rise. - proving that "privatisation" solves nothing.

[Master of Ossus]

The transition from planned to market economies in many Asian nations was behind much of the problem with free state health services giving way to often costly private clinics, according to the fund.

i think the point is that in places where people have no access to basic healthcare due to costs and lack of government provision for them (aka socialism) deaths inevitably rise. - proving that "privatisation" solves nothing.

That's a HUGE strawman, though, since privatization advocates rarely if ever claim that privatization will dramatically reduce death rates in children. Moreover, as PainRack said, it's ridiculous to try and win points for a socialized system by pointing out that in Cambodia and North Korea health care has suffered from being privatized without looking at developed nations like Japan and South Korea.

[The_Nice_Guy]

I had a friend who did a paper on Singapore's healthcare system for his honors thesis. He indicated that Singapore's(our) country's system was actually privatised to a degree unimaginable by almost any other developed country, with a high percentage of the total bill for healthcare being paid by citizens themselves(via insurance and Medicare) and not the government through taxation funding. Comparatively speaking.

There's the minimal safety net for all citizens. But it is very minimal. I keep praying every election that it stays that way, and I prefer to donate my money to charities and healthcare institutions instead of having the government take it away from me. And donating blood every few months, of course.

Within that article itself, you can spot the problems from a mile away. While they were blaming privatised medicine, they also mentioned malnutrition as a huge factor. Hello, maybe children are simply not getting enough food in Cambodia, as opposed to the lack of medical attention? As to how a socialised medical system can help that, I have no idea.

TWG

[PainRack]

There's the minimal safety net for all citizens. But it is very minimal. I keep praying every election that it stays that way, and I prefer to donate my money to charities and healthcare institutions instead of having the government take it away from me. And donating blood every few months, of course.


TWG

You still live with your parents, right? What income tax do you even pay?