The World Health Day celebrated on April 7 aims to promote awareness among people towards the importance of good health. Archana Jyoti talks to people from various walks of life about the challenges and issues that need to be sorted out in the sector to achieve the goal of Health for All, which happens to be the theme for this year’s D-Day too

Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh

WHO Regional Director

South-East Asia

Today, in the shadow of the Covid-19 crisis, around 40 per cent of people in the Region are unable to access essential health services. In 2017, around 299 million people in the Region faced catastrophic health spending, and an estimated 117 million people in the Region were pushed or further pushed below the purchasing power parity poverty line of US$ 1.90 a day – a figure that has since been exacerbated..

As highlighted by the Region’s 2021 Strategy for Primary Health Care, as well as the Region’s vision to build back better from the Covid-19 pandemic, whole-of-government, whole-of-society action is needed to drive rapid and sustained progress towards UHC and Health for All. We must all contribute.

The Covid-19 crisis has shown that investments in UHC and health system resilience underpin not just health, but social and economic security, as well as the achievement of an array of Sustainable Development Goals.

Policy makers and programme managers must continue to implement the Region’s Strategy for PHC. A specific focus should be strengthening public health infrastructure, workforce and financing, while at the same time increasing equity for those at risk of or who are already being left behind. Shared learning must continue to be a core priority, leveraging the full power of the Region’s new Forum for PHC-Oriented Health Systems.

Dr Rajesh Kumar

Senior Consultant

Internal Medicine, Paras Health Gurugram

Due to its huge population, India faces unique challenges and issues regarding public health. Poverty, illiteracy, language barrier, quality, accessibility and last-mile delivery of healthcare services are some of the major challenges our country faces in improving public health outcomes of the masses.

However, it is heart-warming to note that India has made positive strides in public health in the last several decades.   But there is still a long way to go. For example, India spends less than two per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on healthcare and our out-of-pocket expense is one of the highest. The road ahead would be increasing our health expenditure considerably, improving public health surveillance and diagnostic and improving last-mile delivery of healthcare services through proper governance and a robust public healthcare infrastructure.

Dr GS Grewal

Former President (Punjab Medical Council), SAS Grewal Multispeciality Hospital, Ludhiana

Successive governments have ignored health and education despite the fact these two are the assets for the development of any society. There has been a meagre allocation of budget in these two sectors. Therefore we have witnessed corporatisation of health in the last few decades. No doubt every doctor is duty bound morally and ethically to give medical aid in case of emergency but their genuine grievances should be sorted out through dialogue. It would be wrong to paint all the doctors with the same brush. Several corporate hospitals however have been allotted land at throw away prices but they have failed to comply with the clause of giving free medical aid in return. This is because there is complete failure of the regulatory bodies. Medical treatment has become very expensive and causes exorbitant burden on the out of pocket expenditure by the patients. It is time that regulatory mechanism should be strengthened. The institutions which have been given charitable status and have received benefits from the government should put up a board highlighting their charitable status and also mention the obligations due to them.

Dr Sarvesh Pandey

Orthopedician, Vice president

RDA, RML Hospital, Delhi

General Secretary, FORDA

As we talk about Health for All, it is important to introspect the Right to Health bill brought by Rajasthan Government in its original form. We believe it was a poorly thought misadventure without strong and valuable inputs from the medical fraternity. As healthcare professionals, we are committed to ensuring that every individual has access to quality healthcare. We believe that the government should first focus on strengthening their own healthcare systems for the general public to realize that their interests are the primary focus and not just as a vote bank. However, after the recent protests, we are pleased to see that changes have been made to exempt small private setups from the ambit of the bill. Despite this, we feel that the remaining provisions still require better implementation and forethought.

Dr Manish Jangra

Founder FAIMA, MD Dermatologist

As you know Health is one of the fundamental rights according to article 21 of constitution of India  Being Fundamental right every citizen of india deserves a better & affordable healthcare that to be ensured by Government of India. Medical professionals born in India are providing quality health not just in India but as well as abroad making us proud but at the same  time of recession economy slowing down the government of the day needs to support citizens of the country to get affordable and quality healthcare irrespective of socio-economic status. On this World Health Day We choose Health For All for this year for the same reason. Hopefully we will be able to achieve it.

Akshi Khandelwal

Founder & CEO

Butterfly Ayurveda

The age-old Indian life science of Ayurveda refers to health as ‘Swasthya’, or ‘Swastha’ which essentially means to be rooted in self. It lays stress on practicing and learning activities that bring together the mind and body, such as ‘Yoga’,  and the practice of ‘Dhyana’, meditation, to find the inner rhythm of your own. This inner rhythm becomes the guiding force or the guiding light for our daily living, and helps us  bring balance into the daily routine, bring focus and awareness to our diet, lifestyle and fitness regimen.  It empowers us to transform our health. Further, learning about our own Ayurvedic body-mind constitution empowers us to make better decisions with respect to everything in life.

Sandeep Chachra

Executive Director

ActionAid Association

"The Covid-19 pandemic showed that our current policies left no country prepared to handle such a health emergency. Since variants keep threatening the world, and new pandemics may also happen, it is time for all countries to scale up investment in public health services and ensure everyone has access to medical support. Making healthcare a fundamental right for all may be the desirable and much-needed way forward. And in doing so, we need to ensure that the right to health is to a free, good quality, universal, gender-responsive public service that remains sensitive to the diversities of populations it serves.

JR Gupta

President

Senior Citizens Council of Delhi

The Health For All Day gives us an opportunity to create awareness about the problems faced by we senior citizens. I would request the Government that senior citizens should be issued health cards and allowed health insurance policy without any extra premium while health mobile vans should be deployed in remote areas across India. To ensure less medical burden on the patients, Health budget should be doubled and the health budget should be doubled. Also, the Delhi Government should implement National Ayushman Health Scheme.