“All this time the formulation of health policies has actually not been evidence-based when it should based on accurate data,” said Firman Lubis, a medical professor from the University of Indonesia.

Firman said the government’s health policies were often motivated by projects.

“Often policies are made because they are part of a project funded by the government and initiated by someone who thinks a certain issue [on which the policy is based] is important,” he told The Jakarta Post in a telephone interview.

Such policies often had ineffective results, wasted funds and did not address the problems that needed urgent attention, Firman said.

Earlier this week, the Center for Health Service Management launched the Indonesian Health Policies website (kebijakankesehatanindonesia.net) aiming to serve as a bridge between researchers, members of the community and policy and decision makers.

Laksono Trisnantoro, the director of the Gajah Mada University Center for Health Service that manages the website, said the government was in need of accurate data as well as analysis methods for its programs.

“All this time, there have been no systematic methods in place to analyze Indonesia’s health policies,”
he said.

The website would host forums discussing Indonesia’s health policies, as well as various references such as news articles, research and program reports on those policies.

“From several decades back there has been no clear relationship between [health] policy making and scientific evidence. This [website] is designed so that researchers can have an input [in policy making],” Laksono said.

The government’s program was not effective or transparent and did not use a clear model, he added.

“We have to look at this case by case. For health funding, for example, there no research model for Askeskin [the health insurance for the poor scheme] or Jamkesmas [community health insurance scheme]. In Thailand, they used extensive research [for such schemes],” Laksono said.

There are several health treatment cost coverage schemes for Indonesians, including Jamkesmas, which could provide exemption of payment to poor patients of state hospitals and private hospitals that joined the scheme; and Jamsostek, which is the workers’ healthcare scheme.

The government is currently working to develop a new system, based on the 2004 Social Security Law, that is said to provide Indonesians with universal coverage for health treatments. Under this system, all citizens would be insured under a state or commercial health insurance plan.

Healthcare funding is one of the topics of discussion on the new website. Provoking topics the forum covers include the government’s options in forming an institution to carry out the task of managing universal coverage.

This particular subject has already garnered four comments, from one claiming to being the Sukabumi Health Agency (in West Java).

Aside from economic problems such as healthcare funding, Firman said the government was also in need of accurate data to determine the state of healthcare and public health in Indonesia.

“The data is often under-reported. Such as [that of] malaria and tuberculosis. Even the number of deaths is still underreported ... the data is often unreliable because there are too many forms to fill in [during surveys], poor methods of filing, and so on,” he said. (dis)

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