Are you saving for your health?

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By Meluse Kapatamoyo

Not many Zambian workers are lucky to work for companies which offer health insurance, especially not a freelance journalist like me. And while I have been wise enough to save money for a rainy day, I had not made any plans to spend it on hospital bills.

However, that is exactly what I had to spend it on when I suddenly fell very sick recently and was admitted to hospital. I had been there before. But the difference between then and now was that previously I had time to financially prepare for my entire duration in hospital. This time around, I had already spent some kwacha on festive shopping.

Although the running around and placement of where I would spend the next few nights was done by my family members, seeing the bill and how much I needed to pay to stay in my “high cost” ward left me very worried, even more so when the costs for the tests I was to have came through.

Worried about bills

Instead of worrying about getting better, I found myself silently calculating how much I had in all my accounts. Every doctor and nurse’s visit to my bed meant more money, especially when the person entrusted to make me better prescribed a new drug or injection. Letting go of my ATM card, so my family member could withdraw money for my tests, was torture.

Six days later when I was discharged, part of my savings had been depleted.
Instead of being thankful that I would enter 2010 in the company of my family, I was thinking about what I needed to do to earn that money back.

It took me a while to realise that the money saved was used for its intended purpose. That is the reason it was saved in the first place - for unplanned eventualities or emergencies. My disappointment was that I had been thinking to use it for something else. But I should have been saving money for my health all along. Like so many people, I had refused to entertain such negative thoughts. 

Save for your Health

However, if you can manage to put away a little monthly saving for a new car, house or a trip away, why not your health? If you don’t have your health, you cannot enjoy all the other things anyway. And yes, you can choose to spend your time in hospital at wards that are cheaper. But who can determine how long you may stay there, and besides, there are costs there too. The bottom line is, we should all be looking at saving for potential medical and health costs, no matter where or how get treatment.

The time when the hospital bills of a patient were paid by family members is long gone. Not only are hospital bills high, people have many other responsibilities. If I ever end up in hospital again, it will be a time for me to rest and not to worry about money.

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