Medical Talk Wk 3 - Public VS Private Healthcare Systems

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According to the World Health Organisation a health system consists of all organisations, people and actions whose primary intent is to promote, restore or maintain health.

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What this is trying to let us understand is that there are systems set in place that is responsible for taking care of our health. This health care system covers a whole lot of services from preventive health care to primary health care to special care and to emergency services. Health care workers are not limited to only hospitals alone, they can be found in the office, sports, schools, airports, government etc. These health systems can be categorized into public and private health care systems.

There are several importance of health care systems and they are:

• treating sick and injured patients
• Responding to emergencies like in the case of Covid-19, Ebola, fire outbreak wars etc
• Educating people on how to stay healthy and providing vaccines for preventive purposes
• They make sure everyone have access to treatments irrespective of your status, color, culture etc
• Research and innovation.

Now that I’ve have established a little knowledge on the subject matter, it’s now time we dive in to the business of the day and that is “Public vs Private Health Care System”.

But before going ahead let us please welcome our extinguished steemians @uduak01, @adeaze and @sol02 to participate in this contest.

Public health care systems

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Public health care system are health system provided by the government in a state. Since health care is the responsibility of the government, expenses are at a subsidized rate considering its citizens. In some cases, it’s free healthcare for all. Due to the low cost, it attracts so many people from all walks of life. As a result of this, the patients usually outnumber the public health care workers and this brings about brain poor services.

In order to meet the basic needs of its citizens by protecting their health, governments go as far as setting up general hospitals in different rural areas to provide health services.

Private health care systems

This is owned by either private organizations or an individual and are totally free from government control, thereby giving them autonomous power to charge any amount of their choice. So, you have to be rich to be able to afford it. The health system is strictly profit oriented. Service here is faster and better and they are well equipped with modern equipment for treatment.

Base on the above description, the health care system likely to provide access to healthcare to everyone is “public health care”.

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• One of the essential roles of government is to provide health care systems for its citizens and so, it’s the primary purpose of the government to fund everything that has to do with it. Money for funding can be generated through taxation but in private health care, funds are gotten from private individuals. The highest government can do for them is to cut down on their taxes or support them with soft loans to help them stand on their feet.

• In public health care systems, all the rules and regulations is made by the government to ensure that everyone receives fair treatment and prices is not manipulated by their staffs but in private health care systems, the owner of the hospital sets the rules and regulations and prices are determined by forces of demand and supply of the customers and competitors. The little government can do in Nigeria is setting up agencies like National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and Standard Organization of Nigeria (SON) to make sure they don’t give substandard medicines and materials to patients.

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In terms of very affordable, Public Health Service is more affordable and in some case especially in villages, you can get treatment for free. Since every thing is funded by tax payers money, it is only normal for the government to give treatment at a subsidized price and affordable for everyone.

The reverse is the case when it comes to private health care systems. You have to be rich to be able to afford their prices. The shocking thing is that most of this private hospitals are own by doctors working in government hospitals. Due to the negligence of the government in Nigeria and the poor health facilities in government hospitals, this doctors refer patients to their private hospitals and collect good money for the treatment.

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The quality of health care in public system is nowhere near private systems. In Nigeria because of the way healthcare experts are been treated by the government, a lot of them have resigned and have gone overseas to a much more juicier offer there. A lot of them you see in public health care systems are student doctors or practitioners. The few experts are leaving to set up their own hospitals and they charge very high there. The quality in public sector is horrible.

Sometimes, the way the nurses treats patients, you might be forced to arrest them because they are so ill mannered and don’t have any form of sympathy but in private health , the nurses treat their patients very well or they stand the risk of loosing their job.

Public health tends to have more expert in certain medical fields compared to private health care systems that have limited experts.

Medical facilities in public health are in a poor state or are outdated but in private health care systems, equipment are state of the art.

The environment of public health care is nothing to write home about and the stench that comes out from patients littered all over the floor due to filled up wards is enough to make you sick but in private health care, you will rarely see such things. The environment is very neat and well coordinated.

In conclusion, whether it is private or public healthcare system they both serve the same purpose, saving lives. Your money in your account is the only determining factor that will tell you the best place to get your treatment.

Government as well, should try and put more effort in building more health facilities and equipping it with modern structures and also employ more health practitioners to meet up with the demand crowd that comes for treatment.