Health crisis
Wanted: foreign doctors. That was the call by the Thai government recently, the intention being, as Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra put it, to turn the country into a 'regional medical hub'. Foreign doctors do not need to take a Thai language exam, as they used to, in order to qualify.
On the face of it, the call makes sense. Bangkok has lots of private hospitals and its reputation is growing as the place to fly to for a heart operation or nose job.
It has 110 private hospitals - more private facilities per head than most other capitals in the world. And they are actually 'over-equipped', according to a foreign medical expert, with an abundance of hi-tech gadgets. The service is relatively cheap and the standards are high.
But is there more to the call for doctors than meets the eye? According to Medical Council President Somsak Lohlekha, there is no shortage of doctors to cater to foreign patients. Many Thai doctors speak good English, he told the Bangkok Post recently. So why the need for foreign doctors?
The problem is in the public health service. A 'major medical crisis' is said to be looming as doctors, particularly the younger ones, leave government hospitals. More than 1,000 have quit the public-health service in the last two years and there is now an acute shortage in the provinces.
What gives? According to one Bangkok-based doctor, those working in the public sector have been poorly treated by the government for a long time, with too little funding and not enough help with infrastructure. Now the Thaksin government's new flagship '30 baht (HK$6) health care' scheme is kicking in, the public service is in danger of collapse.
This scheme for cheap treatment is great in theory as it offers care for those who may otherwise be unable to afford it.
But there is a catch; it threatens the financial solvency of hospitals and is resulting in seriously inadequate health care from doctors, if many reported cases are anything to go by.
So when the government says that the doors are open to foreign doctors, are they really only focusing on the idea of a money-making regional medical hub, or are they trying to shore up the crumbling public-health service?
Maybe the government needs to listen to the gripes of its own doctors before inviting in foreigners.
