TEHRAN — Health Minister Hassan Qazizadeh-Hashemi has voiced regret and disappointment about unfair criticism of the national healthcare reform plan.

In a recent report, the minister has given an account of his latest trip to the underprivileged areas of the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchestan, highlighting the positive and successful outcomes of implementing the healthcare reform plan in these districts.

“I believe those who are heavily biased towards healthcare reform plan don’t even know anything about where these poor villages are or how much hardship the citizens must have endured before conducting the healthcare reform plan,” he explained.

Qazizadeh-Hashemi described that over his four-day trip he had met people who were satisfied with the program for the past three years of its implementation due to better healthcare services access, less out-of-pocket money and more job opportunities created in heath sector.

“However, we still have to try harder to get desirable results,” he noted.

According to the chancellor of Iranshahr University of Medical Sciences, Iraj Zareban, currently there are 294 projects pertaining to health sector underway in the area and there are doctors in all healthcare centers, the minister pointed, additionally the number of the doctors has almost jumped by 5 folds increasing to 117. Moreover, 61 specialists are offering healthcare services to the citizens.

Iran’s healthcare reform plan is a scheme aiming at decreasing the out-of-pocket expenses for the patients, promoting natural birth, supporting underprivileged patients suffering from rare or incurable diseases, etc. which is being administered in Iran currently.

MQ/MG