It’s an agonizing trauma to be laden on a bed already full of patients, but this is the typical predicament of a patient in a Government hospital. On an average one hospital bed in a Government hospital is used for almost 879 people.
The state of Government hospital
We have just told you that one hospital bed is used for nearly 879 people on an average and the situation takes a turn for the worst say the reports. There is a silver lining to the cloud Manipur shows a better average folks!
Every tenth student from Andhra Pradesh takes up medical studies but the state of the hospital bed is shocking, nearly 2,230 people use a hospital bed on a average.
The health ministry verdict
Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad handed over the estimates for January 1, 2013 to the Lok Sabha . The reports state “As per the goals of the 12th Plan, India needs another 5,96,589 hospital beds to reach the target of 500 beds per 10,00,000 people”.
Azad admits that it’s the Central Government that renders finances to different states to support the health systems. The National Rural Health Mission supports the latest up gradation of the health facilities for the public and also helps in the new constructions for the hospitals.
The average in the world says that about 30 beds are needed to cater to a population of about 10,000 people whereas the WHO or the World Health Organization recommends that for 1000 people , the hospitals need to have 1.9 beds.
The reports
Dr K S Reddy, from the Planning Commission’s , high level expert group in India has submitted a report in 2011 that out of the total 1.37 million hospital beds that were accessible almost 8,33,000 beds are in the private hospitals. Experts also say that India shells out nearly 4% of GDP on healthcare.
It’s the turn of the Central Government to carry out the up gradation of almost 19 medical colleges, open 8 new AIIMSes, and it will also cater to the extra 11,390 beds in the tertiary health care services.
‘Understanding Healthcare Access in India’ the latest report submitted by the Indian Institute of Health Care and Informatics state that almost 3 out of the 4 beds in India are found in the urban and private sector. This shocking figure has prompted the Government to encourage private-public partnerships.
We have seen that the public health systems have failed in the expectations of the people and so an unorganized and a badly regulated privately owned hospital system has taken over to take care of the health needs by exploiting people. There are no regulations or laws in this sector and thus the health conditions remain substandard.
The Plan panel report states “An appallingly large number of healthcare providers and facilities from the private and unorganized sectors are exploiting the lack of regulatory mechanisms and causing poor health outcomes.” At the moment the health ministry has taken out a Clinical Establishments Regulation Act and will soon be implementing it in the whole country, at least it will be seen in most of the Union territories.
