Drugs running out, surgeries cancelled as Sri Lanka's health system buckles

Government Medical Officers' Association members walk with placards protesting against Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa after his government lost its majority in parliament during a demonstration near the parliament building in Colombo, Sri Lanka, April 6, 2022. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte/File Photo

COLOMBO (Reuters) - Rosanne White was first diagnosed with cancer eight years ago and lost a kidney. After the cancer returned five years ago, an oncologist in Sri Lanka's commercial capital Colombo started her on Bevacizumab last May, a treatment she was responding to.

White, a 58-year-old Sri Lankan retiree, said she had received the injections free of charge as part of the country's universal government health system, which the vast majority of its 22 million people depend on.