From the Daily News Egypt:
Prime Minister Ahmad Nazif’s plans to privatize Egypt’s health insurance system would have been “a complete waste of public money,” said Khaled Ali, chairman of the Hisham Mubarak Law Center.
Ali was speaking at a press conference held by the Journalists’ Syndicate to discuss the Administrative Court’s decision to halt initial plans of privatization.
The government’s claims that it wants to privatize the health insurance system to improve the quality of services are invalid, Ali argued, because privatizing it would only make it unavailable to the public.
“The constitution doesn’t give the prime minister the authority to issue such a decree. The president and the People’s Assembly are the only entities who can issue those kinds of decrees,” Ali added.
Earlier this month, the Administrative Court halted government plans to place Egypt’s health insurance system under the control of a profit-making company, in what a rights advocate called a “historic” verdict.
The Administrative Court ruled that “the money allocated for health insurance is public money, and the government is not at liberty to handle it.”
The case was raised by the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) in April 2007 and the verdict forces the government to suspend implementation of its plans until a final verdict is issued.
The current non-profitable health insurance system covers 40 hospitals, 600 polyclinics, 3,000 institute clinics, and 500 pharmacies.