Costly treatment: hyper inflation-hit lower, middle class people ignore minor ailments

Sky-rocketing price hike, especially of food items, has squeezed the budget of lower and middle strata of the society, forcing them to ignore minor ailments, reveals data collected by Business Recorder.
A senior physician said that galloping inflation had made life difficult and people were unable to meet their biophysical needs what to talk of psychosocial requirements like healthcare, which was equally important in this competitive world where physically fit manpower had better chances of survival.
Data shows that that incidence of major diseases like tuberculosis, gastrointestinal disorders, hepatitis "A" and "E", stress, typhoid and diabetes is increasing at an alarming rate.
"The treatment of these diseases is too costly. The treatment of hepatitis "A" and "E" cost Rs 10 million per patient, if he undergoes full course. The cost of medicines of gastro per day is Rs 600 for a patient", it added. Tuberculosis also requires six to 11-month course with expensive diet, he maintained.
He further said that the government hospitals did not charge consultancy fee and give no free medicine to the patient. As such he had to bear the cost, which ultimately became difficult for him to manage from his limited budget, he said.
"In these circumstances, the patients belonging to lower and middle class families, try their level best to arrange the resources for treatment, borrowing from their friends or family members", he maintained. Obviously, this class could not afford the charges of private hospitals, he said, adding that this added to the miseries of already resource starved population.
Talking about the private hospitals, he said that these hospitals had increased their treatment charges. "The doctor, who was previously charging Rs 1,000 per patient, now charge Rs 2,000 as consultancy fee. The patient in some cases had to spend similar amount on purchase of medicines, which was beyond the purchasing power of lower and middle class, said the data.
"Same is the case with the private medical stores. Majority of them are selling medicines at the prices of their choice," the data revelled, and added that some of them had re-stamped the prices on already printed packs of the medicines. "There is no law prevalent to check fee structure of doctors and cost of medicines as the people in this business are looting common man, already suffering from hyper inflation", he said.