I refer to the CodeBlue article, “Distrust In Private Health Care Driving Patients To Government: NCSM”, published on April 16, 2026.
The concerns raised in the article about affordability, trust, patient confusion, and system navigation are real and deserve thoughtful engagement. Malaysians do face difficulty understanding where to seek care, how much care may cost, what insurance actually covers, and how to navigate an increasingly fragmented health care landscape. These are serious issues, and they should be addressed with care and intellectual honesty.
What is regrettable, however, is the article’s broad framing and, more specifically, the irresponsible nature of some of the remarks attributed to National Cancer Society Malaysia (NCSM) managing director Dr M. Murallitharan.
To suggest, whether explicitly or by insinuation, that distrust in private health care is driving patients to the public sector because private care is fundamentally transactional, or because doctors may be motivated by personal extravagance, is unfair, reductive, and irresponsible.
Remarks such as whether a doctor is trying to pay his “monthly Ferrari bill” do not elevate public discourse. They degrade it. They cast suspicion not merely on institutions, but on the integrity of medical professionals as a class, based on innuendo rather than evidence.
Dr Murallitharan, of all people, should appreciate the need for greater responsibility when making public statements of this nature. Those who speak with influence in health care should be especially careful not to reduce complex system challenges to cheap caricatures or suggestive soundbites.
Public trust in health care is too fragile, and too important, to be treated in such a careless manner.
If one were to adopt the same logic in reverse, the conclusions would be plainly absurd. When patients leave public hospitals for private ones, do we then say public health care is lazy, inefficient, or uncaring?
When patients turn to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) for help, do we conclude that the public health system is ineffective or irrelevant? Of course not. We understand that patients move across sectors for many reasons, urgency, waiting times, geography, affordability, familiarity, perceived responsiveness, and personal circumstance.
That same fairness and intellectual honesty must apply when patients choose government facilities. One cannot treat patient choice as evidence when it suits a narrative, and complexity when it does not.
Malaysia’s health care system is not served by selective moral insinuation. It is served by clearer thinking. Survey findings of this nature should be used to improve the system for Malaysians, not to shift blame, caricature one segment of the health care ecosystem, or generate attention through provocative but unhelpful statements.
If the findings reveal anxiety about costs, confusion over insurance, or difficulty navigating care, then the responsible response is to strengthen transparency, communication, coordination, and public understanding across the board.
Private health care in Malaysia remains an essential part of national health care capacity. So too do public institutions, payors, civil society organisations, and advocacy groups. No one should be above scrutiny, but neither should any one party be casually painted as the villain of the piece. That is neither responsible nor ethical.
We should all be careful not to contribute to cynicism under the guise of commentary. Health care is too important, and public trust too precious, to be handled so carelessly.
Dr Kamal Amzan is the chief executive officer of IHH Healthcare Malaysia and a board member of the Associations of Private Hospitals of Malaysia (APHM).
- This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of CodeBlue.
