White Paper on financing health care to come
Determining how to best finance health care in this country remains a priority for Government and to further delve into the topic, there are plans to produce a White Paper.
That’s according to Minister of Health, John Boyce, who told reporters at a recent news conference, that a Cabinet paper has already been discussed and approved in principle, and the idea is now to produce a White Paper for further dissemination within the public. His comments came as he said that the Ministry of Health has deliberately put the issue of financing on the table, and held four townhall meetings on it, recognising that in preparing for the future, they must devise a way to ensure the maintenance of the quality of health-care service that Barbadians currently enjoy.
He added that while public health care at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) and the polyclinics remain free at the point of delivery, the reality is that health-care costs are increasing and health-care equipment is extremely expensive and specialised. Given that, he maintained, no shortcuts can be taken.
“We have not only to be prepared in terms of human resource development by way of our doctors and nurses, who now have to be largely specialists. No longer can GPs do this work and no longer can a registered nurse sit on her laurels or his laurels and not realise that unless you go to the point of specialisation in a particular area, we will find ourselves as a nation behind the eight ball in terms of our service,” he said.
The health minister added, “No one has indicated, nor are we indicating now, that anybody pays for public care in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital or our polyclinics, what we are talking about is that specialised care which we know we have to maintain; where would we look to prop up the monies available to help to keep us at the apex of the delivery of health care.”
He made the point while noting that some of the taxes recently imposed were directly put there to assist in the delivery health care, and he further noted that the more efficient we get at delivering our services, the less we will have to lean on any new financing model that is proposed.
The health minister’s comments came as he touched on the role that the polyclinics play in the health care sector. According Boyce, the polyclinics are extremely important, recording 17 000 visits in total per month. He spoke to this as he revealed that the St John Polyclinic, with 1 100 visits per month, is now doing its full quota in terms of the number of clients being seen, but there remains room for expansion. He said the St. John figures are is in keeping with the visits recorded at the Glebe Polyclinic in St. George; while the St. Philip Polyclinic has 1 200 visits monthly and the Branford Taitt Polyclinic records 2 000 visits each month. (JRT)