The study to privatise public heathcare services and hospitals by the government began in the late 1980’s and it came into the open when the Seventh Malaysia plan was unveiled. There were 12 major entities/projects earmarked for privatisation and eight for corporatisation. One of the eight were hospitals.

Apparently the government had studied many healthcare systems in the world but could not find any system that could fit with what the government is looking for until today. This is because there is no where in the world that we can find a system that completely divorces the government from the responsibility to provide healthcare coverage to all its citizens.