Privatised Health Services Worsen Pandemic

By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame SundaramSYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 17 2021 (IPS) Decades of public health cuts have quietly taken a huge human toll, now even more pronounced with the pandemic. Austerity programmes, by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, have forced countries to cut public spending, including health provisioning. ‘Government is the problem’ “India’s COVID crisis: A deadly example of government failure”, “Government failures still hamper [UK] Covid-19 response”. Such headlines have become commonplace as the pandemic rages on, with no sign of ending soon. Their godparents deserve due recognition. Anis ChowdhuryUK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher claimed, “no government can do anything [good]… people look to themselves first… There is no such thing as society … quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves and each of us prepared to turn round and help by our own efforts those who are unfortunate”. US President Ronald Reagan declared, “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem”. Inspired by them, government capacities and public sectors have been decimated in recent decades, ostensibly to liberate entrepreneurship and progress. Four decades of defunding, delegitimization and demoralisation of governments and their personnel since Thatcher and Reagan have taken their toll. Unsurprisingly, most governments have failed to...
Source: IPS Inter Press Service - Health - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: Aid COVID-19 Development & Aid Economy & Trade Europe Global Headlines Health Human Rights Humanitarian Emergencies Inequity Source Type: news