Healthcare System in India

India is one of the most populated countries in the world and has been facing a lot of issues in many sectors. But today I want to highlight the issues related to Healthcare Industry. Since I am working in the Pharma market, so I am very much familiar with the issues. I hope you will find it useful and something better would be done to upgrade the noble sector access which is the basic necessity of the common man.

Healthcare infrastructure in India has been facing significant challenges in terms of accessibility, affordability, and quality of services. Despite the country’s rapidly growing economy, the healthcare sector has not kept pace with the development in other sectors. Here are some of the major challenges in the Indian healthcare infrastructure:

Shortage of healthcare professionals:

India faces a severe lack of doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals, leading to a heavy workload for those who are available. This affects the quality of care and accessibility of healthcare services in rural and remote areas.

As per a recent study estimated (from NHWA 2018) a total stock of 5.76 million health workers which included allopathic doctors (1.16 million), nurses/midwives (2.34 million), pharmacists (1.20 million), dentists (0.27 million), and traditional medical practitioner (AYUSH 0.79 million). However, the active health workforce size estimated (NSSO 2017–2018) is much lower (3.12 million) with allopathic doctors and nurses/midwives estimated as 0.80 million and 1.40 million, respectively. The stock density of doctors and nurses/midwives is 8.8 and 17.7, respectively, per 10,000 persons as per NHWA. However, active health workers’ density (estimated from NSSO) of doctors and nurses/midwives are estimated to be 6.1 and 10.6, respectively. The numbers further drop to 5.0 and 6.0, respectively, after accounting for adequate qualifications. All these estimates are well below the WHO threshold of 44.5 doctors, nurses, and midwives per 10,000 population. The results reflected a highly skewed distribution of the health workforce across states, rural–urban, and public–private sectors. A substantial proportion of active health workers were found not adequately qualified on the one hand and on the other more than 20% of qualified health professionals are not active in labor markets.

Inadequate facilities:

Many parts of the country still lack basic healthcare facilities, and the existing healthcare infrastructure is often inadequate and ill-equipped to deal with the growing demand for services. Especially when I use to visit rural areas, the facilities there are not even at par with any standards. In a lot of rural hospitals, I had seen where instead of getting a cure many people can fall sick due to unhygienic conditions. No one even bothers of cleaning the area.

One pic is attached of one of a rural government hospital.

Poor quality of care:

The quality of care in many public hospitals is often poor, with inadequate facilities, overworked staff, and a lack of standardization. This results in substandard treatment and a high incidence of medical errors. In many areas, Doctors use to have OPDs of 200+ patients each day. One can easily understand how can check each and every patient with 100 percent accuracy.

Then question arises that then why Doctor try to treat each and every patient?

The answer is that in his own path to be a doctor he has taken an oath that he has already pledged to treat each and every patient with same care and will try his best to give proper treatment o each and every patient that visits his place.

High cost of healthcare:

The cost of healthcare in India is often prohibitively high, especially for those not covered by any form of insurance. This leaves many people without access to essential medical services and treatment. This is not because treatment is costly but because per capita income is very low and this makes the treatment very much costly. But present government has taken a good initiative of opening PM-JAY CARDS, where any poor patient can have free treatment up to 5 lakh rupees, that has helped the needy very much.

Lack of R&D:

As everyone know that a lot of expenses are required to have R&D, this is the core reason why India is always lacking behind in this sector. But R&D is and will be the basis of Any sector.

Especially in the case of healthcare industry, where a lot of diseases like COVID, and Aids use to occur at regular intervals, R&D is very necessary. Moreover, in the past few times, a lot of substandard drugs were obtained in many countries, that were manufactured in India. Maybe the combinations or the ingredients used were not having proper checks or there was not any evidence of study done before. Moreover there must be labs to have regular checks for the medicines being used by the Doctors, so that doctors or patient can check and rely on the drugs they are using.

Negligence in Medicines Quality:

A lot of times, peoples complain of low standards of results with the medicines used. They don’t understand why this is happening?

Moreover, A lot of mafias use to work here that create substandard drugs under the banners of branded drugs. This is also a very serious matter. Instead of blaming the government here, I think this is the case of moral values. But still needs to be checked because it can harm anybody’s life.

Check on Quacks:

One trend that is becoming common these days is the trend of advertising the self-proclaimed doctor, without any degree or experience. This trend is also harming the Healthcare Industry. The person who knows nothing used to speak ill of anybody and that creates NEWS. Is it useful for anyone?

Anyone from the healthcare industry knows that many viruses get calm down after a particular number of days and they don’t treat the disease but try to minimize the aftereffects of it. These quacks treat these diseases first and try to figure out others’ problems afterward. While treating these diseases they create such an ill image of any qualified doctor in the mind of common peoples that they think that these self-proclaimed doctors are the best for them.

This issue has become so dangerous that following posters were needed to be posted few time back.

Degradation by Politics:

Everyone knows that any institute runs from funds only and these funds come from the government. Then why these governments keep on blaming the staff that they are not working properly, whereas this is the duty of governments to make everyone answerable for doing the work. But here in our healthcare sector, two things are missing:

1. Health
2. System

This is because of the politics in our country that we people are going backward or not coming to the expectations of normal people. This is also because of the peer pressure of politicians that many qualified and intelligent doctors are leaving the country. These people must understand every aspect that the people who were our GOD in Covid times and we were saluting them by calling them Covid Warriors, are now getting treated as Dakus.

Just think, if any other disease gets outbarked, Would they work like this time?

So learn to give respect to healthcare professionals, before it gets too late.

Despite these challenges, there have been some efforts to improve the healthcare infrastructure in India. For example, the government has launched several initiatives to increase access to healthcare services, particularly in rural and remote areas. Private investment in the healthcare sector has also increased, leading to the development of new hospitals and clinics.

In conclusion, the healthcare infrastructure in India continues to face significant challenges. Still, there are also efforts underway to address these issues and improve the quality of healthcare services for the country’s population.

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