Higher health spend should reach rural centres

CHENNAI: Ever since the Prime Minister announced that plans were afoot to increase India's health care spend from less than one per cent of the GDP to a sizeable 2.5 per cent, stakeholders in the public health setup have been cheerful. Not only will this increased spend reflect in better infrastructure in public health services, but it will also ensure more jobs, focus on medical research and hopefully, better salaries. "It is good that India has finally woken up to the challenge of having a strong public health sector. The UK, USA and even smaller European nations have built a very strong public health system. The only way this kind of a disease burden can be tackled is by getting people to come for subsidised health care," said the retired Dean of a premier medical college here.Dr Ravindran, who has worked in PHCs in Vellore, Salem and Namakkal, said that the expectation was for better salaries for rural doctors, "The infrastructure, drug availability and quality of healthcare is slowly reaching a certain standard in all government hospitals. But what separates rural PHCs and block-level hospitals from city hospitals is the fact that doctors are paid on different scales. As a result, even if a person from Arni or Vandawasi manages to graduate with an MBBS degree, his aim is to work in Coimbatore or Chennai," he reasons. Besides salaries for doctors, incentives for ancillary medical workers was also mooted. A growth spurt in public health service will kill the private sectors business. However, if the government opts for value-oriented health care schemes under a PPP (Public Private Partnership) model, then private health care will be able to maintain their section of the market.