Amnesty International Report on the State of North Korean Health System

A report released last week by Amnesty International states that the North Korean medical system is in utter disarray. The report was drawn from the accounts of more than 40 defectors. It begins with a quote from a woman who defected from Chongjin, North Hamgyong Province.

“We received 15kg of corn and 1 to 2kg of rice
per month. To stretch our income, we made
alcohol from the corn. We also ate the sediments
from the corn alcohol. It was difficult to eat
because of the bitter taste, but we were hungry
and had to eat them. There was no choice. The
leftover corn husks were used to feed pigs, which
we also raised to earn extra cash.”

The deep famine in North Korea, which reached its peak in the 1990s, has had a drastic negative effect on the health of the North Korean people. Widespread malnutrition has led to chronic immune deficiency making the people vulnerable to a variety of disease epidemics. It is unlikely that even the most efficient and well funded health-care system could combat such conditions. However, the medical system itself is in complete disorder. What was meant to provide free health care to all citizens rich and poor is now nearly completely unsupported by the government.
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"Health facilities are rundown and operate with frequent
power cuts and no heat. Medical personnel often do not
receive salaries, and many hospitals function without
medicines and other essentials."

Doctors have begun charging for services on the black market. As a result, access to health-care is strictly limited to those with disposable income. Individuals often rely on family members to help them get access to medicines and care for them when they are ill.

The report goes on to discuss the ongoing TB epidemic. According to their report currently at least 5% of the population is infected with a significant number of cases of multi-drug resistant TB.

Amnesty's report provides an interesting contrast to the show-hospitals of Pyongyang. However, its suggestions for improvement appear, at least to me, overly obvious and unhelpful: the state must acknowledge and cease the starvation of its citizens, must provide adequate supplies and funding to its hospitals, must provide health and wellness education to its citizens, etc. These actions are completely unlikely to take place in a state which is undergoing an international political crisis and whose most current concern is defending allegations that it sunk a South Korean warship, killing 46 sailors, on March 26 of this year.