Health volunteers to be paid expenses next year

"This project is an urgent policy for this government, " he said at a meeting with top health officials on his first day as public health minister.

He said health volunteers dedicated themselves to work for the ministry without receiving payment since a project was set up 30 years ago. They had to use their own money for travel costs and other expenses to provide primary care and look after people in local communities.

In a bid to encourage them to work as health volunteers for the long-term, the ministry would ask the government to allocate Bt4 billion to support their work as volunteers.

This money was expected to be distributed from March to September next year. Each volunteer would receive Bt600 a month for personal expenses, as they were working for the health ministry.

"Even this payment is a small amount but it is the first step to start the campaign for health-care," he said.

The ministry would talk with the Interior and Finance ministries to find out ways to distribute these funds to health volunteers. He said the Local Administration Organisation, under the Interior Ministry, already had Bt1 billion and the Health Ministry would seek another Bt3 billion to support the idea.

In the long-term, he said the health ministry would issue a ministerial regulation to guarantee monthly expenses to volunteers beyond 2009.

He would speed the process to provide funds to volunteers within three months. He would also establish another project to provide monthly payments to support elderly people in the community.

In regard to the issue of compulsory licensing (CL) of essential drugs, he said he would talk with the Finance and Foreign ministries about this as the country faced economic and export problems now.

"It is sensitive issue to impose compulsory licensing on essential drugs. We are not living alone in this world."

He would consider other approaches to help people to access life-saving drugs and treatment. He would also set up a project to ensure people who don't have identification cards can access healthcare without needing cards.

As the new minister, he would not move any top health officials from their current positions, saying: "I don't want to take revenge or haze anybody."

He promised to take care of all officials and medical workers and to improve their quality of life. He said he would produce more medics, including doctors and nurses, to meet the shortage in manpower.

With the New Year festivities coming, he said he would set up a "happy" checkpoint along the road to provide health services for travellers.

In the morning of his first day as minister, hundreds of health officials gave roses to congratulate him for the new position.

But his face was not so good when he was prayed to the Buddha image at a pavilion inside the ministry compound, as flower jars honouring the Lord Buddha dropped to the floor. Given this could be a bad omen, Witthaya returned to the Buddha pavilion at 3pm to pray to the image again to ask for good signs in the future when he is health minister.