Overcharging parents of a child who died is daylight robbery by private healthcare
The horrific tale of seven-year-old Adya Singh's parents being taken for a financial ride by the doctors and authorities of Fortis Memorial Hospital in Gurugram, where they were charged Rs 18 lakh for 15 days of treatment even though her parents suspected that their daughter was already beyond rescue is both heart-breaking and enraging. If the medical fraternity wants to understand why the public at large distrusts them, thinks of them as thieves, and sometimes goes on the rampage in hospitals, this case explains why. As much as the public at large might have issues with the media and politicians, policemen and the judiciary, chances are that if polled they would put doctors right up there on the list of professionals they distrust. And while the large majority of doctors may work hard and conscientiously, there is no doubt that the Indian health system, starting from the education stage and all the way to the top, is pretty much dysfunctional. Attempts to repair the health education system where candidates who neither have the aptitude nor the necessary baseline educational requirements can make it to medical colleges on the payment of 'donations' have been opposed both by underqualified students, particularly in Tamil Nadu, and medical colleges which are nothing more than unabashed profit-making businesses. When students are exposed to such corruption in the medical education system, the rot obviously continues into the treatment system. Falling seriously ill in India without having the funds to support such a treatment is a guaranteed path to penury. The failure of the Indian state to repair medical education for decades or, until recently, to spread out centres of medical excellence across India as well as the failure to contain costs has meant overcrowding in hospitals like the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi. But corruption is even more apparent in upcountry India as the tragic events in Gorakhpur a few months ago and at the BC Roy Children's Hospital in West Bengal for years, where there have been unacceptable rates of child mortality, highlighted.
India has made remarkable progress in reducing child mortality and has seen a rise in life expectancy; however, the impact of huge income inequality in India is the most evident in aspects such as healthcare. The lack of widespread health insurance coverage across the board in India, the massive bias towards the affluent where health insurance is provided, and several examples wherein coverage is denied and private hospitals overcharge are problems that require Government intervention. The case of Adya has correctly made the headlines but the Union Health Ministry and all States have to step in and monitor hospitals and establish a health ombudsman who can look at cases of overcharging and medical negligence. Many hospitals in India are inventing in marketing themselves abroad and have become a major destination of patients particularly from Afghanistan, Syria and libya. At the same time, Indian patients who can afford it and are fed-up with sub-optimal healthcare and greedy hospitals in India are themselves choosing to head out of the country for treatment. If Indian hospitals do not see that as an indictment, it only means their vision is clouded by moolah. Health Minister JP Nadda should haul up the authorities at Fortis Memorial Hospital for their greed and suspend the guilty doctors and administrative staff. Punitive action and not compromise is the only way things will improve.