Ailing healthcare

The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the problems plaguing India’s healthcare setup, such as infrastructural inadequacies and shortage of skilled manpower. The poor continue to bear the brunt of deficiency in services. The pregnant wife of a UP migrant, who works at a brick-kiln in Jalandhar, died after she and her family were forced to shuttle between three government hospitals and turned away by four private ones. The fact that all these hospitals betrayed the Hippocratic oath for various reasons sums up the sorry state of affairs. The incident happened days after the Punjab Cabinet decided to hike the fee for the five-year MBBS course by about 80 per cent in state-run medical colleges. The revised fee is still far less than what the private players are charging, though it’s higher than that in neighbouring states like Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Generating more funds, however, has to go hand in hand with optimum utilisation of resources to ensure better medical education and infrastructure.

Subsidised education can serve its purpose if its beneficiaries work for a significant period in government hospitals rather than succumbing to the lure of the corporate sector. The situation on the ground is discouraging. In March this year, the Gujarat Assembly was told that nearly 85 per cent of MBBS graduates in the state opted out of serving in a rural area after passing out from government-aided medical colleges in the past two years. The measures taken by various states to make newly minted doctors serve in government health institutions have repeatedly been challenged in courts. In 2019, the Supreme Court had asked the Centre and the Medical Council of India to frame a uniform policy regarding compulsory service to be rendered by doctors who are trained in government institutions.

PM Narendra Modi recently stated that work was underway to ensure that every district of the country has a medical college or post-graduate medical institute. The more doctors India has at its disposal, the better. But it would take much more than mere numbers to provide affordable healthcare for all. This goal can be achieved if all stakeholders work together in public interest.