15.09.2011 Bangladesh

Solidarity from below

Rickshaw drivers in Bangladesh establish a healthcare insurance cooperative

At every intersection in the 15-million-strong metropolis of Dhaka armies of tricycle rickshaws jostle through the inevitable traffic jam, even mounting the pavements if necessary.

It’s seriously hard work: the drivers stand up on the pedals, pedal three, four, five times, gain momentum, sit down, then have to brake and start all over again … all day for up to ten hours. They rest after their shifts at the ‘garage’ belonging to their ‘rickshaw lord’, where they all roll out their sleeping mats. The lord deducts the rent directly from their daily wage of just 8 Euro. Since this gives them slightly more room for manoeuvre than many other poor people, medico’s partner Gonoshastaya Kendra (GK) wants to try out a specific experiment with them: the Gonoshastaya Rickshawpullers Health Cooperative.

This is a mutual health insurance fund that costs the drivers 1 Euro per year. GK provides mobile clinics and basic (primary) healthcare with drugs and comprehensive health awareness-raising in the garages. More comprehensive examinations and treatments are offered to the insured members in the high-rise Gonoshasthaya Nagar Hospital in the city centre. In Bangladesh, however, this is certainly not a step towards privatising healthcare provision: it is a grassroots initiative in the fight for statutory health insurance. medico also supports the project in memory of the history of the German workers’ movement which started out with similar mutual associations.