'Only 22pc get govt healthcare service'

But 60 percent of people could be brought under healthcare service if the existing health infrastructures are properly managed, they claimed.

The meeting was organised jointly by Health Consumers' Rights Forum and Consumers' Association of Bangladesh (Cab) in the city.

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Country's health sector has long been marred due to lack of physicians' attention to patients, wrong diagnosis and treatment, and mismanagement in health administration, said Cab Information Officer Shamsuzzoha in a concept paper.

As a result, a large number of patients travel to different countries like India, Thailand and Singapore everyday to avail better healthcare facilities there, he added.

Though deprived of proper healthcare service, the common men bear 64 percent of the expenses in the health sector while the government bears 23 percent and the non-government organisations 13 percent, Shamsuzzoha said.

Quoting the World Development Report-2004 published by the World Bank, he said 42 percent of the physicians in Bangladesh remain absent at their workplace, while 74 percent remain absent at the Upgraded Family Welfare Centres.

Bangladesh, among the 84 least developed countries, has an immense potential to produce global standard drugs and export them to those countries, if not to the developed ones, said the Chairman of Pharmacy Department of Dhaka University, AFM Faruque.

But the infiltration of low quality drugs from neighbouring countries and adulteration might create a crisis of trust in this promising industry of the country, he said.

Chaired by Cab General Secretary Quazi Faruque, the meeting was also attended by NGO and media representatives.