Africa-Press – Zimbabwe. Dr Vivek Solanki, who is among the leading medical experts in the country, has urged the Government to review the regulations on advertisements to allow medical services providers to advertise the services they offer, H-Metro reported.
Speaking during the Zim Community Trailblazers Awards ceremony in Harare on Friday night, Solanki said:
This is where the problem lies, we are not allowed to advertise, and we cannot put billboards, or adverts in newspapers or magazines to educate the public to say these facilities are available here.
But Coca-Cola, cooking oil advertise, why are they allowed to have a billboard and I cannot have a billboard? I think there is a problem there.
People like us, have to push the button and enlighten the authorities that we have to make the changes, we have to assist.
We have assisted with an open-heart at Parirenyatwa Hospital but we need them to support us in our needs.
I asked them again that we have a need, we need to look into our regulations regarding advertising for the health sector.
When we land in Johannesburg, Nairobi and India, and Dubai, there are billboards and overall advertising for the medical facilities.
Yet we have the same back home and people are not aware of it.
Solanki, who has a special interest in Regenerative Medicine, Aesthetics, Dermatology, and Aviation medicine, added:
I have been in business for 37 years, and people do not know about it, that’s purely because of limitations of dissemination of information about where we are and what we can do.
We need to encourage each other and hold each other’s hand because nobody else will, we do not have the finances to support the health sector.
The younger generation and specialists from Zimbabwe can see from our examples and know that it can be done.
Your future is out here in Zimbabwe. Only Zimbabweans can make a difference, not foreigners, not foreign investment.
Our President talks about medical tourism and the Trauma Centre is big in medical tourism, a lot of foreign patients from all over come here.
I ask; how will the foreigners know when Zimbabweans don’t know what facilities are available in Zimbabwe?
The whole world is a global village today, so whatever technology is available in London, Durban is also available in Harare.
In 2016, the Health Professions Authority (HPA) said Zimbabwe was lagging in providing information to the public on what medical services were available in the country.
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