18 .Health and Welfare
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http://countrystudies.us/mongolia/52.htm
Health-Care Systems
Mongolia's government has made great efforts to
provide modern medical care to the inhabitants. In the 1980s, medical care
was free and was provided through a hierarchy of clinics and hospitals. In
rural areas, the lowest level of the system was a medical station, staffed by
a physician's assistant, serving people within a thirty- to forty-kilometer
radius. Above this was a somon
medical station, staffed by a physician, serving a forty- to sixty-kilometer
radius; an inter-somon
hospital, serving a seventy- to eighty-kilometer radius; and an aymag general
hospital covering a 150- to 200-kilometer radius. The higher the level in the
system, the more numerous the medical specialties and the more sophisticated
the diagnostic equipment available. The lowest levels concentrated on acute
care, public-health work, and screening and referring cases up the hierarchy.
As of 1985, Mongolia had approximately 4,600
physicians, 24.8 per 10,000 people. There were also about 8,500 nurses and
3,800 physician's assistants; many of the nurses and the physician's
assistants specialized as midwives, although some medical personnel were
trained in midwifery only. Medical care was provided by almost 1,200 clinics
staffed by physician's assistants, 290 clinics staffed by physicians, and by
1986, 112 hospitals. The structure of medical specialties reflected both the
needs of the young and rapidly growing population and the concentration of
scarce resources on public health, control of epidemic diseases, and the
health of the working population. The most common medical specialty was
pediatrics, which accounted for 21 percent of all physicians in 1985. The
next most common were general practitioners, 15 percent; obstetricians, 6
percent; public health specialists, 6 percent; and physicians specializing in
the prevention and treatment of epidemic diseases, 6 percent. Government
statistics listed only twenty-seven (0.5 percent) oncologists and no
cardiologists; however, the existence of a large cancer research facility and
the practice of bypass surgery techniques suggest a greater interest in these
areas than the statistics indicate.
In spite of efforts to distribute medical
facilities and specialists evenly, there was a marked concentration of
physicians and hospitals in Ulaanbaatar and other major cities. In 1981
Ulaanbaatar had 49 percent of Mongolia's physicians and an average of 42.9
physicians per 10,000 people. The cities of Darhan and Erdenet had 21.7 and
18.8 physicians, respectively, per 10,000 people; low ratios of 9.5
physicians per 10,000 in Uvs Aymag and 10.2 per 10,000 in Hovsgol Aymag were
also reported.
Mongolia cooperated closely with the Soviet Union
in medical research and training. Soviet specialists held seminars in
Mongolia and helped to build and to operate such special facilities as an
oncology center and a 600-bed isolation hospital for infectious diseases in
Ulaanbaatar. Mongolia was an active member of Comecon's Commission on
Cooperation in Public Health, and it participated in World Health
Organization (WHO) projects on maternity and child health, environmental
protection, and training of medical technicians and mid-level health-care
personnel.
By 1981 Mongolia claimed to have eliminated
smallpox, typhus, plague, poliomyelitis, and diphtheria, and to have reduced
sharply the incidence of other infectious diseases. In the past, disease was
spread through the use of contaminated drinking water and from such sources
as lice, which were common among the herders, who seldom bathed or washed
their clothing. Clean drinking water for the herders, who often shared water
sources with their animals, continued to be a problem, but much effort was
put into health education. The Mongolian Red Cross, an organization that
cooperated with the Mongolian Revolutionary Youth League, focused on preventive
medicine and health education. It sent mobile teams to factories and herding
collectives to teach hygiene and sanitation and to hold special workshops on
infant care and the health needs of the elderly. Although traditional Mongols
were averse to bathing, their modern descendants patronized a network of
spas. Following the Soviet and East European pattern, Mongolia established
sanitoriums where workers and such deserving individuals as holders of the
Order of Maternal Glory went to rest, to take the waters, and to follow a
medically prescribed regimen of swimming, sunbathing, and moderate exercise.
The Council of Mongolian Trade Unions operated a network of sanitoriums that
used the country's many hot springs and mountain lakes. The network annually
could accommodate 20 percent of the country's factory and office workers
during the brief summer season. So popular were the spas that aymag authorities
established their own sanitoriums to provide therapeutic holidays for
collective herders.
Precautions Against AIDS
At the end of 1988, Mongolia had reported no cases
of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). In 1987 an AIDS research
center was opened at the Institute of Hygiene and Virology, and its
specialists were trained in laboratory analysis by WHO experts. About 16,000
people had been checked for the disease by December 1988, but no carriers had
been found. All Mongolians who had been abroad for more than three months
were required to be tested. This was considered necessary because Mongolia
sends thousands of young people to study in other countries. Analysis of
donor blood and blood products had begun by mid-1988, and special
laboratories were being established in large hospitals. Foreign students
coming to Mongolia were required to be tested for AIDS, either in Mongolia or
abroad, and Mongolia accepted the results of tests performed in the United
States.
1.when did the history of modern medicine start in
Mongolia?
2. who found the first hospital in Mongolia?
3. how did
the policy medical develop during the socialist period?
4. When was the World Health Day celebrated in the
first?
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