In a seminar organised last month by Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) firms were urged not to abuse public health facilities and instead make adequate healthcare provision for their workers.
In the first week of June, the local press carried reports that construction companies are delivering groups of workers to HMC’s already stretched Emergency Department with relatively minor complaints in the knowledge that the Emergency Department is the one facility in Qatar where free medical treatment is given regardless of whether a patient has valid documentation.
In some other cases, HMC found expatriate patients would not give the name of their sponsor. All expatriate workers must have a sponsor in order to get work and residency visas. The healthcare organisation has also reported that increasingly patients are coming for treatment without the proper documentation, which means they have to be treated as visitors, rather than residents, which is more expensive, as visitors are not eligible for the discounts residents receive on healthcare.
Presently Qatar offers free public health care to both Qataris and expatriates.
Qatar’s generous public healthcare system has meant the country currently has the highest per capita spending on health care in the region, at around $940 per person. However, the growing population, much of it made up by the increasing number of expatriate labourers, is putting the country’s social infrastructure under greater strain and this kind of spending is considered unsustainable by many.
Currently used only by those who can afford it, or feel they require a certain standard of service, private health care is waiting in the wings. By far the largest private hospital in Qatar is al-Alhi Hospital, with over 200 beds. Although open for business since September 2004, the hospital itself is not yet fully functional and construction work on the road leading to the hospital has meant its emergency department is as yet unusable. Medicare, the owners of al-Alhi Hospital and the company responsible for its management, are expecting to see the hospital’s grand opening later in the year.
Yet for the private healthcare sector to take-off in Qatar, legislation on medical insurance is required. This now forms an integral part of the National Health Authority (NHA)’s healthcare strategy for the country.
“As health care becomes more and more expensive, and if you really want to deliver superior health care, it’s not reasonable to give health care for free at all levels,” Dr Sheikha Ghalia Al Thani, Chairperson of the NHA, recently told OBG. “Health insurance is the answer and we have looked at a number of different insurance networks in the world to find a scheme that will suit Qatar… We expect to have a clearer idea next year.”
The insurance regime will probably see mandatory private insurance coverage for expatriates made the responsibility of sponsors, as while many international companies operating in Qatar already have private health insurance in place for their employees, this is not necessarily the case across the board.
If this kind of insurance regime were to be imposed, the people who would be most greatly affected would most likely be individual Qatari homeowners employing domestic servants. As an employer, the family would be obliged to pay the insurance of the domestic servants who came under their sponsorship. It therefore seems unlikely that such a measure would find popular support.
Without mandatory medical insurance however, advocates argue, the private healthcare sector will remain unable to flourish, while the public healthcare system remains open to abuse.
