The Sri Lanka Medical Association (SLMA) yesterday urged President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to discuss with the Ministers holding relevant portfolios, public officials about securing funding to fulfill the basic needs of the hospitals and the National Immunization Programmes of the country.
The Association in a letter to the President under the hand of its President Prof. Samath D Dharmaratne requested the President to apprise the Association the details of the plans to meet the exigencies related to health and well being of the population.
“We request a clearly laid out road map with time frames to be provided at the earlier possible time.We can then in turn do out duty in reassuring the medical community as well as the general public that solutions to the pressing health and well-being issue are forthcoming”, the Association said .
Excerpts from the letter: “There is an acute shortage of essential medicines, reagents, equipment and consumables in government hospitals and the private healthcare sector in Sri Lanka. Already decisions have been made to curtail some services such as routine surgical operations and even limit the usage of available material to life- threatening illnesses.
This is not at all a sound policy as, what is considered non-emergency situations could turn into life-threatening problems within a few hours. In addition, this is not a sustainable policy and unless urgent replenishment of supplies is made, within a matter of weeks, if not days, emergency treatment will also not be possible.
This will result in a catastrophic number of deaths, which is likely to be in excess of the combined death toll of COVID, Tsunami and the Civil War. Health encompasses physical, mental, social and spiritual well-being of people.
Hence, we are greatly concerned about the shortages of food and essential paraphernalia for people to provide themselves with basic needs such as nutrition, transport and electricity.
“We accept that the current crisis has no immediate solutions and are willing to extend our expertise, guidance and advice to you at this moment.
“We have initiated discussions with our members on preservation of the existing stocks of medicines and consumables to last for as long as possible (which may be only a very short-term solution) by prudent use.
We do appreciate that even patients having non-emergency and non-urgent illnesses require optimal care and withholding their treatment will pose medical and ethical problems for the doctors of the country”.
Saturday, April 9, 2022 – 01:02