Budget 2018: Additional Grant Shows Government's Priority For Healthcare Needs
KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 28 (Bernama) -- An increase in the allocation for the Health Ministry in the 2018 Budget clearly shows that the government gives priority to the health care needs of the rakyat , Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr S.Subramaniam said.
The ministry had been given RM27 billion next year, which is roughly a 9.5 percent or 1.7 billion increase from 2017 Budget , totalling RM26.58 billion.
"We have proposed to the Prime Minister a very robust budget for healthcare, and I am pleased with the announcement as this will assist our ongoing health transformation initiatives apart from providing a strong base for health services to the rakyat," he said in a statement here.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak when tabling the 2018 Budget at the Dewan Rakyat yesterday among others had proposed that RM2.5 billion will be spent on medical supplies while RM1.6 billion will be set aside for consumable items and medical support equipment.
Najib has also allocated RM1.4 billion for hospital maintenance and upgrade works for Muar Hospital, Banting Hospital and Balik Pulau Hospital.
While RM10 million is allocated for the treatment of increasing cases of rare diseases and RM30 million is provided for Healthy Community Empowers the Nation (Kospen) programme to create awareness about non-communicable diseases (NCD) in 10,000 locations nationwide
"Kospen is a community health promotion programme with 40,000 trained volunteers in the country...we will empower them so we can increase our war against NCD," he said.
Dr Subramaniam also lauded the government's effort for allocating RM30 million to boost end-to-end service in medical health tourism as well as promote In Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) technology and cardiology services, which came under the allocation for health tourism.
--BERNAMA
