I was listening to a radio show on the BBC news about health care in different countries. They compare the situation in :

• USA – where you need to pay insurance to get good health care
• UK – where you need to pay high taxes to get good health care
• China – where you need to be both rich and living in cities to get good health care

I was particularly interested in the China situation because they noted that the chief problem was actually rural health care. There used to be a system of “barefoot doctors” to give primary health care to villages. Minimal training, minimal equipment but able to provide basic services.

This is called primary health care. But this system has been taken over by a more privatized model leaving many rural folk with poorer health care. I believe that my staff, my company and I are in the health care industry as well, and I was thinking where we fit in.

Of course we don’t have much of a rural health problem here in Singapore, but if primary health care takes care of basic medical problems, where does PREVENTION come in?

I take my job so seriously because I believe what my staff and I do is preventive medicine and…

Prevention is Pre-Primary health care

Not “more important” than medical professionals but equally important as part of any nations desire to have the healthiest, fittest and most productive citizens. That’s one of the reasons I write the “If I Was The Singapore Minister Of Health” series on this blog.

Remember to persue HEALTH insted of fighting disease.