By Queville To
KOTA KINABALU: Healthcare in Sabah is a sick joke! Take the district hospital in Kota Belud, for instance. Patients sleep on the concrete floor, the wards are hot and poorly ventilated and the atmosphere is chaotic.
This was the sight that met Kota Kinabalu MP and Sabah DAP chairman Dr Hiew King Cheu when he paid a visit to the government's main healthcare centre in the district.
Wards that were designed for four beds and were supposed to be air-conditioned had 12 patients sweltering in the heat.
Hiew and other Sabah DAP leaders who paid a surprise visit to the hospital on Sunday were shocked to see patients being treated on the floor.
He said he could not believe what he was seeing.
He questioned the Health Ministry over its judgement in assigning a 29-year-old doctor to take charge of the hospital.
“How can the ministry appoint such a young doctor with limited experience in administrative work to run a big hospital like this?” he asked.
He said he had brought the issue to the attention of the Health Minister Liow Tiong Lai during the debate on the 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP) in Parliament recently.
He added that he was dissatisfied with the answer given by Liow who merely said the young doctor is qualified to do his job.
He said the situation at the hospital clearly showed that either the doctor cannot cope or that the government is ignoring its duty to provide healthcare in Sabah.
No specialists or life-saving equipment
Hiew also noted the absence of specialist doctors even though the hospital is equipped with an operation room.
Currently, all patients who need surgery have to be sent to the hospitals in Kota Kinabalu by road, normally a two-hour journey.
“There is a helicopter pad there but it was never been used,” he said.
He also expressed concern over the lack of critical life-saving medical equipment, even though the hospital is tasked with serving a large population there.
State Assistant Health Minister Rosnah Abd Rashid Shirlin told the state assembly recently that the Health Ministry has taken note of the problem of insufficient hospital beds in Kota Kinabalu.
She assured that several problems facing healthcare services in the state would be addressed under the 10MP.
Hiew, however, warned that the sick cannot wait for the 10MP to be implemented.
He said the government did not even have enough money to buy beds for Kota Belud Hospital but was assuring that it could solve the state's healthcare woes.
