Good afternoon my Colleagues in training and also my teacher Mr Brown.

As Jamaicans,

we live in an society where we all love to hear the term “Free”, whether its free food, free water,

free air, as long as we Jamaican’s won’t have to spend a dime. My fellow classmates, today I

will be speaking about the free health care system and how it impacts Jamaicans. Firstly, these

impacts are inclusive of affordability in the care system in place assisting persons who are not

able to care for themselves. Secondly, the lengthy waiting period for assistance. Thirdly, the

shortage of resources.

Citizens will seek medical attention for the slightest form of illness because it’s free. In

instance, back then/ in ancient time persons would seek home remedies from extracts as “bush”

they called “natural medicines”. Bear in mind, this was before they knew about pills and free

medication these “medicines” would work and cure their illness. What the government is

actually saying is that, persons that can at least afford to pay the admin fee should actually do so

because many that can afford it is not doing so. Permanent secretary in the health ministry, Dr

Jean Dixon mention in The Gleaner on the 10 th of April 2010 that the Government admits that

free health care is at a great expense but calls the Programme a success. Additionally it was also

said that public-health sector has given up more than $4 billion in potential income since the

Government introduced the free health-care system two years ago. But this has not prevented

health and government officials from describing the system as a success. Since the no-user-fee

policy was introduced, the use of the public health-care system has increased by between 16 and

23 per cent, leaving government officials determined to stay the course.

 September 9, 2015, the Gleaner stated that patients are waiting far too long in clinics and

emergency rooms. They wait for elective surgeries, and they wait for the results of test, which is

true. Due to the number of patients present at the health care across Jamaica, it is overcrowded.

These long waiting periods are also cause by lack of resources, but I will address this later in my

speech. Before seeing a doctor patients have to be going through guards, collecting ticket

number, waiting for their names to be called. After that process, patients will then see a nurse

which will decide how sick you are, after going through that process, the patients will have to

wait for couples more hours for their names to be called to see a doctor. After seeing the doctor,

they may undergo various tests. The patient then commence treatment or is sent to wait again

until the results of the tests are back. Audience, bear in mind, the results may not be presented

the same day. If so, the doctor will provide a prescription to the patient which may cause another

long waiting period at the pharmacy, the permanent secretary admitted that the increase in the

number of persons seeking treatment since the introduction of the no-user-fee policy has posed

some challenges. The Minister of Health explained that as many as 70 per cent of the persons

who turn up at emergency departments ought not to be there and should have visited a clinic

instead. There is ample anecdotal evidence of patients dying while waiting to be treated at

hospital. The average wait time from the patient's arrival at hospital till he gets a diagnosis and

treatment or is discharged could be as long as seven hours, Dr Christopher Tufton stated.

Finally, acute shortages in the public health-care system are hurting the very people that

Government's no-user-fee policy is meant to protect because the resources are just not enough to

guarantee efficient and timely medical attention. Due to the lack of resources patients are having

it really hard in the health care system. Back then, persons usually pay an admin fee, this fee

assisted in providing supplies. On the 7th of December 2016, the gleaner mention that the
shortage of beds as an example. The Minister of Health stated that a study had been done a few

years ago suggests that there ought to be about 7,000 hospital beds to serve the population.

However, there are about 3,500 beds in the public health-care sector.

In conclusion, free health care is important for our citizen and mostly for those who cannot

afford it, and because so the health care system is over crowed for many person. And for those

who can afford should at least pay the administration fee to at least help in proving more

equipment’s for patients that are in need. I recommend that person that can afford to pay the

administrative fee to do so. Another recommendation is that only citizen should benefit from free

health care, there is no policy in place that said u can’t access free health care. And that policy

should be put in place. And lastly, lock of founding cause lock of resources, staff works under

unworkable condition, which affect service level.

 References

Dawes, A. Dr (2015, September 9) fixing health: why the long wait. Jamaica-gleaner.com.
Retrieved from http://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/health/20150909/fixing-health-why-long-
wait

(2016, December 7) free health care farce? Jamaica- gleaner.com

Retrieved from http://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/lead-stories/20161207/free-health-care-farce

(2013, June 10) Poor Benefiting More From Free Health Care - CaPRI Survey. Jamaica- gleaner.com
Retrieved from http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20130610/lead/lead3.html

(2010, April 10) Hefty Price For Free Health Care. Jamaican- gleaner.com.
Retrieved from http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20100410/lead/lead1.html