Hospitals stop treating patients on Sehat cards

As the political stalemate persists in the country with the political future of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government hanging in the balance, all public and private sector hospitals in the Rawalpindi division have surreptitiously refused to treat patients entitled to Sehat Insaf Card.

Interestingly, public and private hospitals have started giving dates after dates to patients who had been allocated days for operations.

Sources said that hospitals' management was concerned about the reimbursement of expenses to be incurred under the health card if the PTI government is booted out of power.

Hundreds of patients, who visited more than 25 public and private hospitals in Rawalpindi, Jhelum, Attock and Chakwal, have been denied under the Sehat card, sources said.

An official working in a government hospital said on condition of anonymity that since April 1, the hospitals have stopped accepting further admissions and operations on the Sehat Insaf Card without a plausible explanation and announcement, causing a great deal of distress to the patients and their families.

“The management of the hospitals are concerned as to how the money will be collected from the new government if the PTI government is thrown out of power,” the health official said adding that patients already admitted to hospitals prior to April 1 were being treated while those who come after April 1 were given new dates every day.

Shamshad Hussain, a patient who had visited the Rawalpindi Institute of Cardiology from Muzaffarabad, said that last month doctors decided to perform bypass surgery on him and assured him that all the expenses to be incurred on the operation would be reimbursed through Sehat Insaf Card.

“Now, doctors are refusing to conduct the operation despite their assurance. They have asked me to go to a private hospital. When I visited a private hospital with the Sehat Card, the hospital refused to accept the card and demanded cash,” he said.

Shamshad said he hailed from a poor family and if he had money, he would never have used the Sehat Insaf Card. “The government should restore this facility so that the poor can get free treatment,” he said.

When Rawalpindi District Health Authority officials were contacted about the refusal of Sehat cards for providing free medical treatment, they said that the system of Sehat Insaf Card was very complicated and complaints regarding its veracity can be confirmed by health authorities in Lahore or from health card counters in hospitals.

The officials said that no orders have officially been issued by the top health officials for not treating patients entitled to the Sehat Insaf Card.

They said that the Sehat Insaf Card facility has been provided by the government of Pakistan with a guarantee of reimbursement on the incurring expenses of a patient and there is no justification for not providing facilities to the citizens.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 9^th, 2022.