KUALA LUMPUR: The Ministry of Health (MOH) is targeting a hospital bed ratio of 2.08 bed to 1,000 residents by the end of the 12th Malaysia Plan (12MP), the Dewan Rakyat was told today.

Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the ratio achieved in 2020 which was end of the 11th Malaysia Plan (11MP) was 2.01 beds, with the number of beds increasing from 55,952 in 2016 to 65,508 beds in 2020.

"To achieve the set target, MOH will continue the initiative to raise the number of beds through the construction of new hospitals and upgrading existing hospitals and facilities.

"Focus is given to areas where existing hospitals have high bed occupancy," he said during Minister's Question Time at Dewan Rakyat today in reply to a question by S Kesavan (PH-Sungai Siput) on the government's target to achieve higher level in the provision of hospital beds for more comfortable health facilities for the people.

He said among the other factors taken into consideration was population density, access to existing hospital services and the financial allocation of the government.

He said MOH also took the approach of optimising the number of beds via daily treatment at major hospitals to reduce the need for patient beds and the implementation of hospital cluster programme.

Meanwhile, Khairy said from the cooperation of MOH with 76 private hospitals nationwide, 3,974 medical procedures were outsourced to private hospitals as at the end of July for the treatment of non-COVID-19 patients.

"Despite facing COVID-19, MOH did not stop or reduce its health services for non-COVID-19 patients especially for emergency and semi-emergency cases.

"...MOH also studied the possibility of providing special non-COVID-19 hospitals to conduct elective surgeries which have been postponed," he said in reply to a question on treatment procedures for non-COVID-19 patients currently.

He said for the purpose, the ministry would be seeking allocation from the treasury to ensure postponed cases especially non-elective surgeries be outsourced to private hospitals.

Khairy said the measure was implemented by MOH to ensure non-COVID-19 patients received adequate treatment including extending the operation hours of specialist clinics and operation theatre in certain hospitals after office hours as well as improving the service of virtual clinic.

Apart from that, he said MOH also optimised the usage of non-specialist hospitals as well as the hospitals of the Malaysian Armed Forces (MAF) for certain operation procedures through cluster hospital programme as well as mobilising MOH specialists and private specialists to hospitals which do not have certain specialist services.

-- BERNAMA