T

he West Java governor said that a lack of information about the state-run health insurance program for poor people led to the tragic death of an 8-month-old girl after two hospitals refused to admit her because her parents could not afford their services.

Nizsa Ismail, who lived with her parents on Jl. Pasantren in Cimahi, West Java, died in the Intensive Care Unit of Mitra Anugerah Lestari Hospital in Cibaligo, Cimahi, on Oct. 22, having being sick with a high fever since Oct. 20.

Nizsa’s parents — Martin Ismail, 27, and Susan Kania, 29 — were turned down by two hospitals because they could not afford to pay the down payment of Rp 500,000 (US$56.5) that the hospitals requested to admit their child.

The third hospital they went to admitted their child, but by then her situation was too serious and she died there.

They said the hospitals had neglected the needs of their child.

Governor Ahmad Heryawan said that he expected the media to be objective in covering the story so that the public could understand the real situation.

“The media should make sure whether the parents were just expressing their emotions, or whether there was actually a problem,” he told reporters after opening the 2011 West Java International Expo at Grand Royal Panghegar Hotel in Bandung on Tuesday.

Cimahi Health Office secretary Huzen Rachmadi said a preliminary investigation that he had ordered, concluded on Monday that the two hospitals had acted appropriately in dealing with the patient.

“We have assigned a team and the hospital handled the case according to the procedures,” Huzen said.

Huzen instead blamed the patient’s parents for not applying for Community Health Insurance (Jamkesmas) or Provincial Health Insurance (Jamkesda) for low-income families provided by the government.

“As an underprivileged family, they should have been signed up with Jamkesmas or Jamkesda so that they could easily get treatment at state-run hospitals for free,” Huzen said.

He added that Martin should have gone to Cibabat Regional Hospital which specialized in treating patients from Cimahi who were covered by Jamkesmas insurance.

Martin said he had never been approached by the neighborhood unit chief about the government’s free health insurance.

“No one offered me that, and I wasn’t aware of it,” Martin said.

He said he had not taken his daughter to the state-run Cibabat Hospital because his neighbors had told him that treatment there was expensive.

The Mitra Anugerah Lestari hospital management allowed Martin to bring home his daughter’s body after he had promised to settle the outstanding medical fees, which amounted to Rp 1.3 million, within 24 hours.

West Java Health Office head Alma Luciyati said that the problem was down to miscommunication because the doctors at Mitra Anugerah Lestari Hospital had failed to explain the medical procedures in detail, so the patient’s parents felt their daughter had been neglected.