Bangladesh Health Minister Zahid Maleque has said that the country lags behind in health research and its health sector remains neglected, Prothom Alo newspaper reported.

 “Currently, our health sector gets only 0.9 per cent allocation of the budget. In many countries, this allocation is between three to 10 per cent. We have been working to take the allocation somewhere around nine to 10 per cent.”

“I want to say it rather strongly, we did not give due importance to the health sector. We’ve neglected this sector,” the minister said.

Maleque was the state minister for health in the previous term of ruling Awami League government.

The minister lamented that the country was paying the price for neglecting the sector during the raging coronavirus pandemic.

“Not only we, no country gave due importance to the health sector. Everyone is realising during this pandemic that how helpless we are,” he said.

“We also lag behind in health research. We have to improve here,” he added.

(SAM)