Doctors seek return of hospitals to DOH

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine Medical Association on Tuesday called for the return of the local public hospitals and health centers to the control of the Department of Health (DOH).

Philippine Medical Association (PMA) president Dr. Leo Olarte, in a news forum, said there was a need to bring back the supervision of local medical facilities to the national government because local government units (LGUs) failed to adequately provide quality health services to the people.

The Local Government Code in 1991 devolved the support and supervision of hospitals from the national government to local government units.

“There is now a clamor to bring back control and supervision of the health system to the DOH,” said Olarte.

Failure to provide

He cited the apparent failure of the local governments to provide ample funding leading to lack of necessary medical supplies in many hospitals. Health workers were given low salaries, he added.

“The salaries and benefits were affected because some LGUs could not afford the same salaries and benefits for health workers in local government units. The same thing happened with the medical supplies, which ran short because of lack of budget,” said Olarte.

As a result, the public is being short-changed and are not receiving the kind of health services they deserve, he said.

Demoralization

He said the problem has also resulted in the demoralization of government health workers.

The PMA president called for the standardization of wages of health workers in order to prevent them from leaving government service and opting for employment abroad.

To strengthen the government’s health programs, the looming shortage of doctors needs to be addressed, he added.

Olarte stressed that the ideal doctor-to-patient ratio should be one doctor for every 100 individuals, or one million for 100 million.

“At our present count, we have 70,000 active members of the PMA and that relegates to a shortage of 930,000 doctors, more or less,” he said.