Chairman Sir,
The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Report, ‘The quality of death’, commissioned by the Lien Foundation ranks end-of-life care services across the world. Apart from palliative care, the ‘End-of-life care’ in the report also includes ‘broader social, legal and spiritual elements of care relevant to quality of death.’
Singapore was ranked 18 out of 40 countries1 in the ‘Quality of Death’ index. Countries that ranked higher than us include the United Kingdom (UK), Australia, New Zealand and Taiwan.
Singapore’s economic transformation from third World to first World was borne out of the hard work put in by past generations of Singaporeans. Now that these aged Singaporeans are approaching the end of their lives on earth, it is a shame that the quality of end-of-life care given to them is not of a first world standard.
Even countries such as Belgium and Ireland are able to achieve better scores than Singapore in the four areas covered by the ‘Quality of Death’ report. These are:
a. Basic End-of-Life Healthcare Environment;
b. Availability of End-of-Life Care;
c. Cost of End-of-Life care; and
d. Quality of End-of-Life care.
Why is Singapore falling behind so many countries in these areas?
Sir, I would like to ask the Minister for Health on MOH’s initiative towards end-of-life care services. I noted the minister seems to encourage Singaporeans to die at home to avoid consuming scarce hospital resource.
The Government has shown itself capable of giving out $1.5 billion in “Growth Dividends” to all citizens including the richest among us. Could it not consider re-allocating such public money towards support and subsidies for end-of-life care in the areas of palliative care, hospice and home care for the elderly and poor among us?