With more than seven million foreign workers in the Kingdom, the tremendous increase in the number of polyclinics where foreign workers are tested for diseases prior to granting them residence permits (iqamas) was only natural. All expatriates must carry out such tests to prove that they are medically fit and free from diseases like HIV and hepatitis. Without these certificates, they cannot get residence permits. With such huge market potential, competition was inevitable among the thousands of polyclinics that provide the service, reflected in significant reductions and cuts in fees that these clinics charge. “There are two important instruments to keep track of what (the clinics) are doing, monitoring of the service centers and inspection of their laboratories,” said Dr. Abdulmajeed Khan, advisor to the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health for Planning and Development in the service, He said the ministry attaches great importance to these tests because they focus on some chronic diseases such as AIDS and bacterial diseases. He added that in some cases, the tests are conducted while the disease is in the incubation stage. “This means that the disease will appear after the incubation period, which sometimes lasts six months. Meanwhile, the result will be negative,” giving the false impression that the subject is healthy. He pointed out that this partly explains why some workers seem to develop viral and bacterial diseases after they already had been tested. Dr. Muhammed Abdul Jawad , assistant dirctor of the Jeddah Health Department's Private Sector division, said the ministry does not tolerate any tampering in these tests. He said the department had sealed off one of the largest medical centers in Jeddah last month, because it didn't strictly carry out the ministry's conditions and rules. A worker in one of the centers which provides the service said on condition of anonymity the fierce competition among these centers turned them into profit hunters “This is manifested in the fees they charge service seekers, which in most centers does not exceed SR50,” he said. “This furnishes conclusive evidence that the result of these tests is not worth the paper they were written on.” Muhammed Aal Sodan, supervisor of the Workers' Test Centers division of the Private Health Department at the ministry, admitted the occurrence of some violations among polyclinics. He said the ministry forces medical centers to hire qualified staff in all specializations including radiologists and specialists in microbiology, hematology and virology adding it also makes it obligatory for them to secure very sophisticated laboratory devices. Aal Sodan said the ministry allows the private sector to provide the service as a complementary to government hospitals. He added that there are 23 licensed centers in Jeddah alone. __
