Roll back Sehat Sahulat Program
Asif Khan Turk
The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf-led Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government started the Sehat Sahulat Program (SSP) with the launching of Sehat Insaf Card in 2016 to provide free medical coverage to the residents of KP, as probably it was of the view to modernize the healthcare system and reduce the burden of health budget of the province like developed countries.
According to government sources, prior to 2016, the total health budget of KP was around Rs 20-25 billion per year, while currently, the total annual budget of the SSP is approximately Rs 30 billion. To calculate these figures, the overall budget of the provincial health department is now more than Rs 50 billion per year, resulting in a big failure of the policy to overcome the financial burden of the government health sector.
As far as modernization and advancement of the healthcare system of KP is concerned, it should be noted that there is a huge difference between the economies and healthcare systems of Pakistan and various developed counties, so comparing the homeland with developed states is like living in a fool’s paradise, because, it will take too much time to reach to their position by adopting an advanced health insurance system.
Now, the SSP has badly failed due to its poor performance and is unable to serve the public in an effective and sustainable way as the provincial government is almost unable to pay its huge expenditures, and for the last many months, its services are being suspended again and again because of the unavailability of funds.
Many people have also termed the SSP as a white elephant, because, huge malpractices and corruption by different stakeholders, especially private hospitals, have been reported. Apart from this, most of the medicines and other medical items being provided under the SSP are of very poor quality while purchase of such low-grade items from non-reputable pharma companies also raises serious questions on the performance of the concerned quarters and officials.
All this situation has been regularly highlighted very exclusively by media for the last few months, but no proper and strong action has been taken yet against the culprits. Because of this state of affairs, the SSP has itself become a big burden on government exchequer and there is high need to roll back it immediately and relaunch the previous healthcare system with solid reforms and improvements to serve the public in a better way.
Hence now, there is no way to control the vulnerable situation of healthcare, being faced by the residents of the province but to shut down the SSP on priority basis and divert its funds for free medical treatment at all government hospitals as in the past, free treatment was available to everyone over there. However, in the present time, neither free treatment is available at government hospitals, nor the SSP is able to provide better health coverage. Therefore, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government should seriously think over this issue in larger public interest and devise an efficient and sustainable strategy to control the miserable situation of health sector in the province.
One thing more, before planning and making any such policy in this regard, the scientific and logical analysis of the ground realities and societal conditions of the province and its people is a must by the provincial government and the concerned stakeholders, as without such effort, the KP government will not be able to achieve the goal of establishing an efficient, reliable, and sustainable healthcare system for all.
The writer is a Peshawar-based journalist, author, and the Editor of the Sunrise Today. He can be contacted at: asif1015@yahoo.com. He also shares insights on Twitter @TheAsifKhanTurk.
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