KARACHI: The federal government has for the first time imposed sales tax on more than 200 medical devices, blood bags and other medical devices, including angiography, angioplasty, kits used in the diagnosis of various diseases, in the budget of the current financial year for 2024-25 to help poor patients. Basic health facilities were also taken away from them, the burden of all the additional costs of imposing sales tax on medical devices and other medical devices was directly put on the poor patients.
For the first time, the government of Pakistan has imposed a tax on the diagnosis and treatment of patients’ diseases. The sales tax imposed will increase the cost of diagnosis and treatment by 25 to 30 percent, while the sales tax will provide billions of rupees to government hospitals. will also severely affect the budget, due to which there will be a significant reduction in the number of routine operations, angiography and angioplasty in government hospitals, on the other hand, the poor and middle class will be directly affected in private hospitals.
Chairman Healthcare Devices Association of Pakistan Masood Ahmed told Express that the federal government has proposed to impose sales tax on all medical devices and other medical equipment and diagnostic kits imported from foreign countries in the budget of the current fiscal year. The association has issued a letter to the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister to abolish sales tax on medical devices, saying that imposing sales tax will make treatment in private hospitals beyond the reach of the poor man.
The budgets of government hospitals will be severely affected, he said that due to the imposition of sales tax, patients who come for treatment in hospitals supported by charitable organizations may miss out on treatment and it is not possible to treat poor people there. It will be possible, he said that 95% of the medical devices and medical equipment in all hospitals of Pakistan are imported from foreign countries, similarly the prices of routine medical tests in private laboratories will increase by 30%. About 200 items including all devices, medical instruments, stents used in angioplasty, blood test kits, blood bags, urine bags, syringes are included.
Treatment is not a luxury, but a compulsion, Dr. Junaid Ali
Former provincial health minister and president of Private Hospitals and Clinics Association Dr. Syed Junaid Ali Shah said that the government’s imposition of 15 percent sales tax on diagnostic kits will directly affect patients and the poor. There will be an extraordinary burden on the patients, he said in an emergency meeting of the Private Hospitals and Clinics Association in reference to the recent debate to give industry status to health service providers.
The health sector is given special importance worldwide, but in most countries, healthcare is an industry, Dr. Junaid Ali Shah said, adding that in this year’s discussion, these health care products also have a 3 to 5 percent market share. Duty has been imposed which was duty free which will not only increase the charges of private hospitals but also burden the patients coming for treatment. He said that treatment is not a luxury but it is such a compulsion that the patient has to go to the hospital for his treatment.
Although all private hospitals, including Bam, try not to impose additional burden of treatment on patients, if the tax burden continues as it is, the situation will become more alarming as private hospitals do not get any subsidy from the government. . However, they demanded the government to immediately review the imposed taxes, in the emergency meeting of PH&CA, Vice President of the Association Dr. Bilal Faiz Khan, General Secretary of PH&CA Prof. Dr. Farhan Isa, Joint Secretary Dr. Muhammad Iqbal participated.
