Malaysia: Towards an Ageing Nation



Statistics show that Malaysia is marching towards an ageing nation.

An ageing society is defined as having a minimum 7% of its population aged 65 and older, while an aged nation has 14% or more in that age group.

The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific’s 2016 population data sheet shows that as of last year, Malaysians aged 60 and above comprise 9.5% of the population.
This is projected to increase to 14.4% in 13 years’ time and nearly a quarter of the population (23.5%) by 2050.

Malaysia’s march towards this milestone is an accelerated one. Most developed nations took almost a century to reach this mark.

France, for example, took 115 years to move from being an ageing society to an aged one. For Malaysia, it should take us just 25 years.

In effect, such numbers reflect one of Malaysia’s success stories – healthcare.

It has been 60 years since independence and during that time, Malaysia managed to increase the lifespan by about 20 years.

Improvements in primary public healthcare such as sanitation, food safety and protection against infectious diseases via vaccination have all contributed to this increased life expectancy.

As of last year, the average life span of a Malaysian is at 74.7 years; in 2000, it was 72.2 years.

Unfortunately, living longer has not translated to better quality of life.

The rates of infectious diseases may have gone down, but the number of those afflicted with lifestyle/non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, obesity and cancer has risen and more worryingly, continues to rise.

The National Health and Morbid­ity Survey 2015 revealed that obese Malaysians make up 17.7% of the population, while those categorised as overweight make up 30%. The obesity rate for 1996 was 4.4%, and 14% in 2006.

The same survey found that about 3.5 million or 17.5% of Malaysians aged 18 and above have diabetes. In 2006, this figure was 11.6%; it was 15.2% in 2011.

Malaysians are having to live longer in ill health or putting in another way "ageing unhealthily".

All this takes a toll on the healthcare system, with the Government having to allocate increased financial resources to help provide treatment to people living with such conditions.

The proposed Aged Healthcare Act is a start, which aims for better regulation and monitoring of aged healthcare centres in the country.

There is also a need to look at the delivery of healthcare to the aged with support services, infrastructure, laws that safeguard the elderly and community engagement prog­rammes, age-friendly culture that embraces the elderly instead of isolating them.etc as additional considerations.
 
Thus it is of importance to educate and implement "preventive healthcare" and  "wellness programmes" to the population at an early age so that on-ageing, the aged do not end up living the last 20 to 30 years of their lives saddled with multiple diseases that burden not only their respective families but also the community and country.

 /theSTAR 24-05-2017

Disclaimer: Views or opinions expressed are solely those of the Author and should be used with discretion. The Author shall not be held liable for any acts or omissions arising from the use of the information. The user will be personally liable for any damages or other liability arising hereof.

Post a Comment

Women and Children's Hospital: To be Opened in Q3, 2017



The new Wo­­men and Children’s Hospital within Hospital Kuala Lumpur (HKL) will be ready as early as August, 2017.

Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr S. Subramaniam said the facility is 99% completed and will open its doors in August or September, 2017.

“All maternity and children’s services will be moved there,” he said during a visit to HKL’s emergency department yesterday.

The RM848mil complex for women and children will have 600 beds and help ease congestion at the existing Paediatrics’ Institute.

Another project that has been approved is a new operating theatre complex, which will have an intensive care unit and additional wards. “The tender process for the project will be called in a few months,” he added.

Another RM40mil to upgrade the emergency department. has also been committed.

The outpatient, non-emergency clinic in Jalan Flet­cher, built at a cost of RM50mil, was opened last month, April 2017, to ease the congestion at the emergency department.

An MRT station would be built for HKL, scheduled for completion in 2022. Meanwhile, DUKE Highway had also been requested to build an access road to the Hospital.
/theSTAR 19-05-2017


Disclaimer: Views or opinions expressed are solely those of the Author and should be used with discretion. The Author shall not be held liable for any acts or omissions arising from the use of the information. The user will be personally liable for any damages or other liability arising hereof.

Post a Comment

Rubber gloves: Great market potential for Growth



Malaysian rubber gloves are highly sought after by many countries and for the first quarter of 2017, the country exported more than RM4bil worth of product. This is a 26% increase compared to the first quarter of 2016, which recorded RM3.2bil in sales.

Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister, YB Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong said Malaysian rubber products are currently exported to more than 195 countries. Exports have increased more than threefold from RM5.4bil in 2000 to RM18.2bil in 2016.

He said that out of the total exports for rubber products, RM13.3bil, or 73%, was contributed by rubber gloves.

“Malaysia has remained a world leader in rubber glove exports for the last two decades, capturing over 60% share in the global market.

“Between 2012 and 2016, the export of rubber gloves increased at an average rate of 6% annually.

“The growth momentum is expected to continue in 2017 to reach RM14.1bil in exports,” Mah siad.
 
He also said the per capita consumption of gloves in Asia is relatively low at about 5.5 pairs per year on average, compared to 75 pairs in the United States and 50 pairs in Europe.

Consumption per capita of medical gloves in China is currently at three pairs while in Malaysia, it is about 10 pairs per year for one consumer, he added.

“The market potential in Asian countries for the products, especially China, is huge.

 /theSTAR 22-05-2017


Disclaimer: Views or opinions expressed are solely those of the Author and should be used with discretion. The Author shall not be held liable for any acts or omissions arising from the use of the information. The user will be personally liable for any damages or other liability arising hereof.

Post a Comment

IHH: Earnings for Q1, 2017 soared to RM470mil



IHH Healthcare Bhd’s partial divestment of its stake in Apollo Hospitals, has led the world’s second largest healthcare group’s net profit for the first quarter of financial year 2017 ended March 31, to nearly double to RM470.05mil on a year-on-year comparison.

IHH announced that its net profit doubled following a RM313.4mil gain from the group’s divestment of a non-core 6.07% stake in Apollo Hospitals.

The partial sale of stake was done in March this year, as part of IHH’s plan to consolidate and rationalise its investment in India to its two recently acquired hospitals – Continental Hospitals and Global Hospitals. 

To note, IHH further disposed its remaining 4.78% stake in the Apollo Hospitals for RM551.1mil on 19th May 2017.





Top line grew by 8.5% to RM2.68bil, compared to the preceding year corresponding quarter. IHH’s revenue growth was achieved on the back of operational expansion and sustained growth in inpatient admissions.

“The acquisition of Tokuda Group and City Clinic Group in June 2016, also contributed to the increase in the group’s first quarter revenue.

Moving forward, IHH is optimistic for commendable financial results, underpinned by the sustained demand for quality private healthcare in its home markets and key growth markets of India and Greater China.

In the year ahead, IHH expects to face cost pressures on several fronts. These include continued competition for talent, pre-operational and start-up costs from new operations, and higher purchasing costs with the stronger USD. It intends to mitigate these through prudent cost management, taking on higher revenue intensity procedures and ramping up new facilities to achieve optimum operational efficiencies.

/theSTAR 20-05-2017



Disclaimer: Views or opinions expressed are solely those of the Author and should be used with discretion. The Author shall not be held liable for any acts or omissions arising from the use of the information. The user will be personally liable for any damages or other liability arising hereof.

Post a Comment

Cataract - A great Concern



Malaysians can expect a cataract “tsunami” come 2050, with many of them possibly ending up blind if their condition is not detected early and treated ac­­cor­­dingly, said the Health Minis­try.

Its deputy ophthalmology service head Dr Mohd Aziz Husni said there were currently 120,000 cataract patients, and the number was expected to triple in 33 years as the country ages.

A cataract is a condition in which the lens of an eye becomes cloudy.

Age-related cataracts typically oc­­cur in older people, but this condition is usually treated by replacing the cloudy lens with an artificial lens.

“We are becoming an ageing nation and we will have more age-related diseases such as cataract and macular degeneration,” Dr Mohd Aziz said at the closing ceremony of the Sayangi Mata Vision Clinic project at the Tun Hussein Onn National Eye Hospital here yesterday.

The National Eye Survey 2014 found 216,000 Malaysians became blind because of delays in cataract surgery.

It also found that the condition caused 272,000 others to be visually impaired, an outcome Dr Mohd Aziz blamed on lack of awareness about cataract, diabetes and glaucoma.

While cataract remains a main cause of preventable blindness, he pointed out that doctors were also seeing a lot of patients with advanced diabetes-related eye diseases due to the high prevalence of diabetes here.

On complaints about long waiting times at government-run eye centres, Dr Mohd Aziz said not all centres were like that, although he agreed that patients at some centres might have to wait up to six months for surgery.

He said the ministry performed 50,000 cataract surgeries a year, while private hospitals as well as university and army hospitals shoulder another 50,000 and 20,000 surgeries respectively.

The ministry’s surgeries were performed in 45 eye departments in hospitals throughout Malaysia, as well as mobile services in the peninsula’s east coast and Sarawak, he said, adding that northern Sabah would get a centre soon.

The ministry also teamed up with NGOs to conduct community cata­ract screening so that people may be referred for further assess­ment.

Besides that, the 1Malaysia Cata­ract Clinic has an ongoing programme, while mobile clinics on board buses operate almost every day to serve areas without ophthalmologists.

/theSTAR 06-05-2017

Disclaimer: Views or opinions expressed are solely those of the Author and should be used with discretion. The Author shall not be held liable for any acts or omissions arising from the use of the information. The user will be personally liable for any damages or other liability arising hereof.

Post a Comment

Ayurvedic Chair in UTAR



Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) is setting up an Ayurvedic Academic Chair within its institution in a bid to widen the range of medical treatments in the country.

A Memorandum of Understan­ding (MoU) was signed between the higher learning institution and the Central Council for Research in Ayurvedic Studies (CCRAS) from India’s AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy) Ministry.

Under the MoU, the Ayurvedic Academic Chair will serve to raise awareness and quality of Ayurvedic education while broadening students’ learning experience in Ayurvedic science.

UTAR president Prof Datuk Dr Chuah Hean Teik said the chair will also look into developing a syllabus for a degree in Ayurveda besides undertaking related academic and research activities.

“Most importantly, this collaboration will lead to a credible source of AYUSH-related information in Malaysia,” he said during the signing ceremony at UTAR’s campus here yesterday. Prof Chuah also said the partnership was timely as the institution is working to build its own hospital in Perak.

“We will be unique in the sense where we have Western, traditional Chinese medicine as well as Ayurvedic medicine for patients to choose from, once it is up and running,” he said.

Present at the signing were Indian Deputy High Commissioner Nikhilesh Chandra Giri, Indian First Secretary (Commerce and Informa­tion) Bramha Kumar, UTAR Inter­nationalisation and Academic Deve­lopment vice-president Prof Dr Ewe Hong Tat, and UTAR Research, Development and Commercialisa­tion vice-president Prof Dr Lee Sze Wei.

/theSTAR 06-05-2017

Disclaimer: Views or opinions expressed are solely those of the Author and should be used with discretion. The Author shall not be held liable for any acts or omissions arising from the use of the information. The user will be personally liable for any damages or other liability arising hereof.

Post a Comment