The health directorate, which comes under the spotlight again, has launched a crackdown on the unlicensed private hospitals and clinics across Bangladesh.

The latest development follows the death of a police officer at a mental health clinic in Dhaka – Mind Aid Psychiatry and De-addiction Hospital. The hospital did not have a licence. Quality concerns also remain as the hospital is running without trained psychologists or required manpower.

Dr Md Farid Hossain Miah, Director (Hospital) of Directorate General of Health Services, told Bangladesh Post on Thursday that they had already instructed the district and upazila health administration to take action against those who run facilities without licences.

“We have a list already,” he said, referring to their earlier steps taken following the Regent Hospital scam in which the clinic was giving fake Covid-19 certificates. Their licence was not renewed either.

He, however, acknowledged that they cannot monitor the quality of care of those hospitals due to lack of manpower.

Lack of quality control means the private hospitals and clinics get opportunity to violate existing rules and regulations. It is also alleged that some dishonest officials of the health department are taking financial benefits from those facilities.

Health analysts suggest taking holistic measures instead of ad-hoc piecemeal steps. “I’ll suggest forming a taskforce now to take care of the whole issue,” Prof KamrulHasan Khan, former vice-chancellor of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University, told Bangladesh Post.

“We always see ad-hoc steps after any untoward situation or media headlines. This should not be the approach. We must have regular monitoring and quality control measures,” he said.

There is no mechanism to investigate ‘medical errors’ which is a preventable adverse effect of care, whether or not it is evident or harmful to the patient. This might include an inaccurate or incomplete diagnosis or treatment of a disease, injury, syndrome, behavior, infection, or other ailment.

Family members of the victims do not have any place to make their complaints.

Director General Prof. Dr. Abul Bashar Mohammad KhurshidAlam on Wednesday said the government is committed to ensuring public health to all.

“Work is still underway to compile a list of illegal hospitals, clinics and diagnostic centers across the country, including in Dhaka,” he said.

In addition to compiling the list, he said, the campaign against the blacklisted hospitals will continue so that people become aware of those shoddy facilities.

“The public must also speak out against illegal hospitals, clinics and diagnostic institutions. These illegal institutions pose threat to public health,” he said.

Following the irregularities of the Regent Hospital over the Covid-19 test, various government agencies launched a campaign against unlicensed hospitals, clinics, diagnostic centers and blood banks.

According to a survey, most of the private hospitals, clinics and diagnostic centers did not renew their license. Many of them did not take licenses at all.

Director (Hospital) DrMdFarid Hossain Miah said they do not have any inspectors to monitor the hospitals and clinics regularly.

“We have two medical officers, four assistant directors, two deputy directors, and one director in the hospital wing. At the district level, we use the civil surgeon office and at the upazila level we use the Upazila Health and Family Welfare Office,” he said.

“We have taken the initiative in Sep and asked all hospitals and clinics to apply for online registration. By the deadline, around 13,000 applied for renewal of their licenses. And the rest nearly 3,000 did not turn up with any application. So we are considering that they are not interested in renewing their license. We asked our district and upazilla health administrators to take action now,” he said.

“We’ll shut down those facilities,” he said, when asked.

The health directorate has already, in an order, asked civil surgeons to ensure that all unauthorised private hospitals, clinics and diagnostic centres are shut down as soon as possible.

After the death of the police officer, senior ASP Anisul Karim, the director general for health services Prof Khurshid said: “That hospital got licence from the Department of Narcotics Control. But they must be authorised by the DGHS to provide any mental health care. That's why we have shut it down.”

Prof KamrulHasan Khan, the former vice-chancellor, however, said the health directorate will need to ensure corruption free inspection of the private facilities.

“The registration process is not easy. We need to make it easy so that hospitals can register or renew licenses on time without any red tape. And of course, you have to m