Egypt’s Minister of Health Ahmed Emad decided to apply a smartcards system for financially vulnerable families in Suez, among other measures to enhance healthcare facilities in the city, according to a Ministry of Health statement on Sunday.
Emad visited the Suez general hospital, a hospital that specialises in lung diseases, and the health insurance hospital on Saturday, and decided to renovate the general hospital emergency rooms and to increase its number of beds and operations rooms.
Emad said he will also provide the city with doctors specialised in neurosurgery and cardiology, and to build a specialised hospital for liver and digestive disorders.
Former minister of health Adel Al-Adawi had previously announced the smartcards subsidies system to provide for low-income families, which cost the government about EGP 3.7m for 7.2 million citizens since its launch in January.
Heart and liver diseases were reported as the top causes of death in Egypt, making up 20.5% of deaths, according to World Health Organisation’s (WHO) reports in 2012.
A recent report published by Egyptian Centre for Social and Economic rights (ECESR) in June mentioned that only 33 beds are available for every 10,000 citizens in Cairo’s hospitals.
Article 18 of the 2014 constitution states the government should allocate at least 3% of the country’s GDP for health sector expenditures to ensure the quality of those facilities.
