We all know that the government hospitals are underfunded and overcrowded. Many hospitals are under-equipped and under-staffed to deal with the sheer number of patients. However, this situation is worse than our worst nightmare when it comes to treating the most dreaded cancers. It is estimated one in four Malaysians will suffer from cancer by the age of 75 years. It is also expected that there will be an increase of 15% in the number of cancer cases by 2020.
Many cancer patients need to undergo radiotherapy as part of their treatment to kill the cancer cells. These include tumours of the brain, lung, breast and prostate. In many cases they can be cured resulting in many years of normal lives. The modern machine used for radiotherapy is called Linear Accelerator.
The normal number of linear accelerators needed is 8 / million population. From the answer given to me, our country needs a total of 240 linear accelerators for our population of 30 million.
Unfortunately, the minister also revealed that there are only 18 linear accelerators in the government sector, which is only 7.5% of the total need. 92.5% of the need for radiotherapy treatment will not be catered for.
Even if we take into account of the 38 linear accelerators in the private hospitals, our country still only managed to cover 23.33% of the total need .
Despite the government’s claim that we have one of the best healthcare services in the world, it is of no use when there are not enough linear accelerators to treat the cancer patients that are desperate in need of urgent treatment and cannot afford to wait for months and months.
What’s worse is there are many states that have no access to the linear accelerators at all in the Ministry of Health hospitals in the northern region and the east coast. These include Perak, Kedah, Penang Island, Perlis and Pahang. These patients are forced to travel hundreds of kilometres to KL for their treatment. What’s worse is these patients are already sick and weakened by their illnesses making them unfit to travel. Or they may have to pay to have treatments in the private hospitals.
The most ironic truth is that a linear accelerator cost between RM17 million to RM 19.6 million. While the RM 77 billion for the 350km long HSR (High Speed Rail) cost is equivalent to 3,928 linear accelerators, and 16.3 times the need of the whole country. For 2015-2017, the government had allocated a relatively measly sum of RM36.6 million to purchase two new linear accelerators in Sabah and Sarawak.
In summary, the government obviously has relatively little interest in the welfare of poor cancer patients compared to the glamorous airports and railroads. The taxes and GST collected should have been spent in upgrading and equipping our hospitals instead. I hereby urge the rakyat to vote for a new Pakatan Harapan government to take care of them when they are ill.