Luxury

A drug store chain is offering a vaccine for ordinary flu at P695 per shot, which its personnel will administer free of charge so consumers can save on doctor’s fees.

The vaccine, as we all know, is not the one for Influenza A(H1N1), the disease formerly known as swine flu until hog raisers and pork-exporting nations protested. Pharmaceutical giants led by Novartis are still rushing the development of the A(H1N1) vaccine.

But some health experts tell us that vaccination against ordinary flu may boost our immune system. So supplies of the regular flu vaccine, though not cheap, may soon run low, like face masks. Two weeks ago when I went to a drug store in Alabang, an elderly woman was told by the sales clerk that they were out of Tamiflu, one of two antiviral drugs (the other is Relenza) used for treating A(H1N1).

The latest killer flu is reportedly resistant to the amantadine class of anti-flu drugs. I’m not sure if the flu vaccine touted by the drug store chain belongs to this class. But the chain’s promo of free administration of the anti-flu shot should sit well with many Filipinos for whom the cost of proper health care has become prohibitive.

The average cost of consultation in a private hospital is P250. An ordinary laboratory test such as a urinalysis also costs about P250. A blood test costs about P400.

Treatment for dengue in one of the top private hospitals can cost up to P100,000. In a smaller private hospital, the amount could be a third of that. Simply monitoring someone with high fever to check for dengue or typhoid can cost about P20,000 for a three-day stay in a private room in a clinic.

In one of the popular medical clinic chains, a two-hour stay in its “treatment room” costs P500.

For the poor with no access to government health services, a fever is treated with an infusion made from Philippine oregano, diarrhea is treated with guava leaves and its unripe fruit, and a nosebleed is treated with a cold compress – unless the bleeding refuses to stop, and that’s the only time the patient makes an effort to see a doctor.

Treated too late, some curable diseases can kill. But the high cost of health care in this country can deter people, and not just the poor, from seeking professional help immediately for what seems like an ordinary affliction. For many Filipinos, proper health care has become a luxury.

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Ignorance of symptoms can also lead to delayed treatment and death. In this area the Department of Health has been doing a good job so far of warning the public about the symptoms of A(H1N1).

Hospitals have been alerted to refer patients with flu symptoms to the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) in Alabang for A(H1N1) diagnosis.

The two confirmed A(H1N1) cases in the country both came from the United States and presumably belong to families that are well-off enough to be fully informed about the disease, including how to prevent its spread.

As in previous disease outbreaks, Filipinos have greeted the looming pandemic with calm. The attitude may be due to fatalism. Or it may be due to the belief that deadly flu viruses do not thrive well in the tropical heat. Also, despite reports of fatalities, A(H1N1) seems to be fairly easy to treat.

In 2003, 46-year-old Filipina nursing assistant Adela Catalon returned to the country from Canada to care for her cancer-stricken father Mauricio. Adela died 10 days later of SARS, or Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which she contracted in Toronto. She infected her father, who also died. Their village in Barangay Vacante, in Pangasinan’s Alcala town, was quarantined for two weeks.

But the disease did not spread. The country has also remained free so far of avian flu. Health experts have also wondered about the low incidence of HIV infection in this country.

Apart from the tropical weather, some Filipinos interviewed in recent days by the press said they were sure they would not get the flu because they took a bath regularly and washed their hands a lot using disinfectant Safeguard. (No, that wasn’t a P&G plug.)

In fact that’s what some Filipinos do when they start running a fever: they take a shower to see if the fever will subside. Some prefer a cold shower; others like it hot. It’s cheaper than seeing a doctor or having a blood test immediately.

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Why is health care so expensive in our country?

Late last year one of our editors found herself in India attending to a colleague who had suffered a massive stroke. The patient’s pulse and heartbeat had disappeared and she was not breathing. But the doctors in an out-of-the-way, crumbling private hospital revived her, put her on a respirator and stabilized her in the ICU, and prepared her for safe transfer to a bigger and better-equipped hospital. The total cost? The equivalent of P3,000.

Some quarters have proposed that the Philippines be marketed as a top destination for medical tourism. The services will include not just cosmetic surgery but also complex operations such as heart bypass surgery, which our physicians perform quite well.

Apart from earning tourism revenue, the business boom could minimize the exodus of nurses, doctors and other health professionals for better paying jobs overseas.

But if we want to enter this market, we have to compete with other countries that are offering similar services at more affordable rates, notably India, Thailand and China. For higher-end medical services, we will be competing with Singapore.

And before we can focus on providing health care to the world, we should first provide affordable and adequate health care to our own people.

We may not always be immune to mutant flu viruses. If Influenza A(H1N1) spreads, there are people who could succumb to the disease mainly due to lack of access to public health care.