Iran's Increased Military Budget at the Expense of Critical Healthcare Situation
NCRI - Despite the propaganda the Iranian regime’s President and his government officials have launched since 2014 regarding the so-called ‘Health Transformation Plan’ and its effects on improving people’s health, especially the low-income population, now in the final months of Rouhani’s government, his Health Minister has revealed that “the budget dedicated to this plan has been reduced each year, so that its budget this year is less than one third of other organizations.”
In an interview with regime’s Channel 5 on the budget dedicated by Rouhani’s government to the Health Transformation Plan, Ghazizadeh Hashemi said that the plan funding has been reduced every year in such a way that its initial budget of 1700 million dollars was decreased to 1000 million dollars a year later, and even further reduced to 700 million dollars this year, of which only 300 million dollars has been funded through the targeted subsidies plan.”
While acknowledging that the healthcare budget is ‘fading away’, regime’s Health Minister also pointed to the effects of inflation on the budget.” The budget dedicated to this organization is less than one third compared to other organizations”, he said.
While people’s healthcare budget is annually decreasing, the other side of the coin is the annual increase in the budget of regime’s oppressive security forces, especially the Revolutionary Guards, so that their budget increased by 35.5 percent in 2015 compared to a year earlier, with the Revolutionary Guards alone enjoying a 50 percent increase. In Budget Bill 2016, nearly 6500 million dollars is dedicated to regime’s military forces which shows a 15.2 percent increase compared to 2015, with the Revolutionary Guards’ 24.3 percent increase being the most compared to other military forces.
