The health sector in Himachal Pradesh is suffering due to increasing vacancies. More than 40 per cent of the posts of medical and paramedical staff remain unfilled in the State.
The worst hit are the medical colleges in the State, with almost 100 per cent vacancies in Hamirpur and Chamba medical colleges.
A reply filed by the Government in the ongoing Budget Session of the Assembly on Thursday said six medical colleges in the State have been doing with paltry staff strength of 2123 while the sanctioned staff strength for these colleges have been 6618. Health Minister, Kaul Singh Thakur, admitted in the Assembly that 9087 posts of doctors and other paramedical staffs were lying vacant in different health facilities in the State. This number includes more than 3300 vacancies in the largest health facilities of the state like IGMC, Shimla, Dr RPMC Tanda or Dr Y S Parmar Medical College at Nahan.
Replying to a query raised by BJP legislator Mahender Thakur, the Health Minister said there were about 22,212 sanctioned posts of medical and para-medical staff in State. Giving details of vacancies in medical colleges, he said, there were 1085 vacant posts at IGMC, Shimla against 2278 sanctioned posts. 524 vacancies in Dr RPMC Tanda out of 1351 sanctioned post and 1712 vacant post in Dr YSPMC Nahan against 1969 sanctioned posts.
Similarly in Medical colleges at Hamripur, Chamba and Ner Chowk have also been facing acute shortage of staff. Hamirpur medical college has 100 percent vacancy as all the 201 sanction posts have been waiting for regular appointments. The situation was equally worse at Chamba as only 1 regular appointment has been made against 201 sanctioned posts in the medical college. The Ner chowk Medical college has a regular staff strength of 58 against 828 sanctioned posts.
In an attempt to defend his Government, Thakur said that the State Government had filled as many as 700 posts, including 550 MBBS doctors, in the last four years. He said that the number of vacancies had gone up as the State Government had sanctioned creation of 3248 new posts in health facilities. He said that Government was creating new posts of doctors after upgrading the Civil Hospital Centre to Primary Health Centres.
Assuring Dehra legislator Ravinder Singh Ravi on appointing more doctors in 100 bed hospital at Dehra, Thakur said that more doctors would be deputed soon in the hospital to check the shortage of medical officer in the hospital. Ravi had accused that the Dehra hospital had not been able to serve patients as the hospital was working with only 4 to 5 doctors, while there was a sanctioned strength of 8 doctors.
Thakur informed the house that five Trauma centers were sanctioned by the Union Government. Appreciating Union Health Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda for allocating 5 trauma centres for the State, Thakur said that he hoped to get center's accord for 9 more trauma centres, which have been under consideration of the Union Government. Earlier, former Health Minsiter and BJP member, Rajiv Bindal alleged that huge number of posts of doctors had been lying vacant, while the Government was creating new posts blindly.