Materia Medica Malaysiana

Health facilities in rural Sabah on par : "Kuala Lumpur: The Health Ministry plans to build more clinics and upgrade the existing equipment at health clinics and rural clinics throughout the country under the 9th Malaysia Plan.
Health Minister Datuk Chua Jui Meng said the move aimed to raise the quality of service at the clinics, particularly for rural dwellers.
He said currently the ministry has 855 Health Clinics (now known as Community Clinics), 101 Child and Maternity Clinics and 1,940 Rural Clinics throughout the country.
On the deployment of medical experts, he said 110 experts on family health had been assigned to health clinics throughout the country and the number was being increased yearly.
He said this in a written reply to Ronald Kiandee (BN-Beluran) who wanted to know the rural health situation in the country, particularly in Sabah.
Chua said rural health facilities in Sabah were on par with that of rural clinics in the peninsula, except for the number of manpower due to the shortage of doctors.
He said that for Sabah, five experts on family medicine had been deployed to the main health clinics, that is, in Kota Kinabalu, Sandakan, Penampang, Menggatal and Tuaran.
He said as of December 2001, Sabah had nine Area Health Offices, 23 District Health Offices, 90 Health Clinics, 195 Rural Clinics, 19 Child and Maternity Clinics and nine Mobile Clinics.
On the maintenance and repairs of equipment and facilities at the health clinics nation-wide, he said the ministry had allocated RM60.5 million annually for the purpose.- Bernama "