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Health
to be a fundamental right soon Eminent lawyer R.K.W. Goonasekera said the 1978 constitution in its fundamental rights provision gave solid guarantees on civic and political rights but left out the vital area of health. He regretted that even in the constitutional chapter on directives for state policy the key area of health was left out. The veteran lawyer said Sri Lanka was a signatory to the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights and this covenant had solid guarantees regarding health rights which Sri Lanka needed to enshrine in its constitution. A spokesman for the Peoples Movement for the Rights of Patients told the workshop that extensive proposals to declare health as a fundamental right and practical aspects of this would be worked out in the coming months and submitted to all parties in parliament. He said the declaration of health as a fundamental right would provide the structural foundation for further measures to introduce and implement a patient's charter whereby the wellbeing of patients would get priority in the health service. Meanwhile the PMRP and other health rights groups are urging the Health Minister to keep his promise and introduce a bill for a national medicinal drug policy. Comprehensive proposals for this policy where the interest of patients will get priority were worked out at a two day consultation of all stakeholders presided over by WHO regional advisor Chrishantha Weerasuriya. With concessions provided under the TRIPS agreement expiring, drug prices in Sri Lanka are likely to go up by about 30% in the coming weeks if the government did not take effective remedial action. The
PMRP and other health rights groups have called on the Health Ministry
to gazette a list of 300 to 400 essential drugs and impose price
control on them to prevent drug prices from rising beyond the reach
of thousands of families. |
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