Number of doctors
The Ministry Of Health & Family Welfare of Bangladesh claims that the country has a doctor patient ratio of 1:3169, considering all the doctors (42,881) registered so far with the BM & DC. However, there is a gross error in the report on working physicians (Govt. & Private) available for care & treatment of ailing patients. Because, many of the doctors (42,881) registered so far with the BM & DC have already expired (dead) & many of the doctors (42,881) registered so far with the BM & DC have left Bangladesh, working abroad (many of whom will not return as they have accepted citizenship of foreign countries), & many of the doctors (42,881) registered so far with the BM & DC are no longer involved in medicare & treatment, that is, they are either involved in business or some other profession, or retired, i.e., they are quite old and infirm for involvement in care & treatment of the people of Bangladesh. When all these factors are rightly considered, the number of working & living physicians (govt. & private) available for care & treatment of ailing patients would be probably less than 13,000. Thus there seems to be a gross error in the report on working physicians available for medicare. This error needs to be corrected. As the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare is run by bureaucrats, who de facto possess no responsibility, they will take no steps to correct the statistical errors of health, the BM & DC, the DGHS, the BMA should take the pioneering role in correcting all discrepancies in health statistics. The BM & DC should first enlist the registered doctors who are living & working in Bangladesh. The BM & DC should enlist the registered doctors who have already expired. They should also enlist the registered doctors who are no longer involved in the profession. Moreover, a good number of registered doctors are involved in health administration, who are in no way directly involved in caring & treating patients. They should also be enlisted. The DGHS & the BMA can't avoid their responsibility in correcting the errors in health statistics.
It is needless to say that when a country has wrong statistics, all the plans, policies & programmes will be difficult to implement. The Ministry Of Health & Family Welfare of Bangladesh is going to announce a 'National Health Policy' based on these statistics. It is to be recollected that our population is increasing by 2.5 millions each year but the number of graduate qualified doctors is not increasing proportionately.
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