CAIRO – A significantly large amount of money is spent on Egyptians' health, estimated at LE61 billion ($10 billion) annually, according to statistics issued by the Ministry of Health. Given that the governmental expenditure does not exceed 29 per cent of this sum, 71 per cent of it is accordingly being paid by patients from their own pockets to hospitals and clinics for the requisite medical services. Discussions of the CanSurvive Association dealt with patients losing their rights to having an appropriate medical service during a seminar held recently, in which critics pointed out the absence of a comprehensive health insurance system. According to Dr Alaa Ghannam, the director of the Health and Human Rights programme, there can be no reform in the medical system without developing the health insurance system. He cited the instance of a liver transplant not being accomplished without form- ing an insurance fund to cope with the high costs of such operations. He added that there is an urgent need to draw up a plan to upgrade governmental hospitals, health units and the hospitals that apply the existing health insurance system and to implement a comprehensive and effective health insurance system, he added. Dr Ghannam remarked that patients in rural areas are not only deprived of appropriate health services, they complain of not being able to easily reach the medical services that are provided, even if they are of low quality. Dr Ghannam highlighted another problem in that the law does not allow to governmental bodies to obtain funding from non-govern- mental community organisations. He further stressed lack of finance as being a chronic problem in the health sector. Although the establishment of health services in Egypt coincided with that of their counterparts in European countries, there is relatively little interest manifested in Egypt in the rights of the patient, especially by doctors, Dr Ghannam contended. The Ministry of Health is not the only body that offers health services; there are investment hospitals and private medical centres at which patients are also losing their rights. Researcher in the Health and Human Rights programme Dalia Abd el-Hamid told Al-Ahram Arabic newspaper of the patient's rights being lost. “When patients go to clinics and hospitals, the doctors are not interested in explaining the legal measures of what is beneficial or may be harmful. The visit ends with the writing of a prescription or recommendation to have blood tests made”. These practices are associated with the culture of the Egyptian society; most patients tend to be ignorant of their rights and, if they have any idea of what their rights are, they abandon them. There is no compatibility between the penalty and the fatal mistakes that are committed by some doctors. Thus punishment does not exceed a fine of LE200 or removing a doctor's name from the register of the Doctors' Association for one year, after which he or she may rejoin the association. However, these affairs are starting be addressed and the first group of Egyptian patients has already been formed, who are concerned with their right to obtain a high standard of medical service and redress the situation in which the Ministry of Health and Health Insurance Authority constantly ignore patients' complaints.
