Private health sector takes full advantage of protracted public doctors' strike
The question which comes to mind most often nowadays on account of the prolonged public doctors' strike is: does Mr. Djamel Ould Abbes, the health Minister, really know about the huge number of the postponed surgical operations in the country's public health facilities?
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A case in point is a desperate woman hailing from the eastern province of M’sila who has been waiting for 2 months now at Algiers Parnet hospital to see her sick baby been operated on but to no avail.
- Everyone wonders if the health Minister, Djamel Ould Abbès, will finally live up to the long-standing claims of the health workers’ Unions in order to allow hundreds of patients receive full medical treatment in the country’s various hospitals and health centers.
- Owing to the public doctors’ work stoppage, hundreds of hapless patients are now rushing to private clinics in Algiers and elsewhere to get medical treatment but at a staggering price.
- Echorouk made a tour of several private clinics in Algiers and noticed that numerous sick patients came from different remote provinces of the country for medical care despite the hardships of the long trips entailed.
- For instance, in the gynecology-obstetrics service, we were told that the cost of an ordinary childbirth reaches 42.000 dinars while childbirth by caesarean operation attains 85.000 dinars at these posh private clinics.
- However, at a Ouled Fayet private clinic in suburban Algiers the cost for the same operation is slightly lower and varies between 38.000 and 45.000 dinars according to the number of days spent by the patient in this clinic.