Malaysia: Universal Health Care Coverage

Malaysia plans to overcome the challenges of achieving universal health coverage (UHC), says the Minister of Health, Datuk Seri Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad.

This will be through the implementation of the Enhanced Primary Health Care programme which addresses the increasing non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and mental health cases.

He also said the government was committed to achieving UHC especially for the vulnerable and underserved people within the population and this would be done through the Peka B40 programme for the low income group.

Malaysia shall continue to do whatever it takes to deliver high quality healthcare to all its people, and to reach each one of them.

"UHC is about equity and access to healthcare services for all, without incurring catastrophic financial hardship," he said at the 72nd World Health Assembly in Geneva on Tuesday, May 21, 2019

Dr Dzulkefly said that the 2017 Global Monitoring Report on Tracking Universal Health Coverage showed that Malaysia scored 70% in the UHC service coverage index.

However, its out of pocket (OOP) expenditure stood at 38% in 2018 although the WHO recommends that the OOP expenditure should be at around 20%

He said the government will also strengthen public-private partnership through the Health Advisory Council, which comprises eminent individuals including, but not limited to, the private medical fraternity.

"We will also address the sustainability of the existing health financing system, which is predominantly tax-based," he said.

Dr Dzulkefly said Malaysia will also enhance data quality and carry out data analytics on the available health indicators by utilising its centralised data storage system, MyHealth Data Warehouse (MyHDW).

Among the challenges that Malaysia faced in order to sustain UHC were the increasing disease burden involving communicable diseases (CDs) and NCDs, emerging ageing population and increasing workload in public facilities, said Dr Dzulkefly.

This is made more difficult with scarcity of financial and human resource which hamper efficient delivery, he added.

"Malaysia also faces continuous maintenance of health facilities, equipment and ICT infrastructure and the lack of capacity to monitor and evaluate the implementation of UHC," he said.

However, Dr Dzulkefly said that “leaving no one behind” has been the core of the government's policy-making.

The Sustainable Development Goals have been prioritized across the ministries in Malaysia and they are seriously looking at ways to help the people further.

/theSTAR 21-05-2019

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.