Raising retirement age will tackle the shortages
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's move to overcome the shortage of medical practitioners by enhancing the retirement age of doctors to 65 years in medical institutions run by the Union and the State Governments, is a welcome step to boost the much-needed basic healthcare in the country. It is expected that the Union Cabinet will soon give a nod to the decision which will make way for doctors to serve patients and provide education for a longer period. Indeed, Modi has candidly admitted that, though there has been an urgent need for more doctors, it was not possible to fill the gap in the last two years of his Government. Now the uniformity in retirement age will bring an end to the myriad rules prevalent across various States regarding a Government doctor’s tenure of service. Understandably, his appeal to doctors to serve poor, pregnant women for 12 days in a year(by referring to the one crore families that have given up lPG subsidy), is meant to boost his regime’s efforts to deal with illness among the poor.
As the pradhan sewak, a term he often uses for himself, Modi, while giving an account of his Government completing two years in office, said that development was the only solution to all problems. Now it is his turn to deliver ‘healthcare and important medicines' to the poorest of the poor. To be precise, India's public health system is still under-performing, poorly funded and largely smothered by high population and appalling sanitation.
Hence, as a first step, the Modi Government must ensure fair and easily accessible public health facilities across the country; BJP-ruled States can set an example for the rest of the country. By the way, it is the same health system, which has helped raise life expectancy from 32 years a few decades ago, to more than 65 with a lesser number of doctors till date. India was home to four-fifth of the world's polio cases in 2002, but our own poorly-funded health system has pulled off the remarkable feat of eradicating polio in the country. So, our doctors, with a raising brigade and morale, could be doing much better, without any iota of doubt. Today, with Indians living longer, their needs have become wider. The extension of medical service would hopefully cater to the millions of aspiring Indians to live better and healthier.
As Prime Minister Modi claims, under the NDA Government, ‘hope has replaced hopelessness' which prevailed during the erstwhile UPA regime at the Centre. It is expected that this new hope gradually removes the gloom in India's ailing public health system in the days to come. The Government must always keep in mind and sight that we have a health system designed primarily for infectious diseases, and it has been finding difficulty in coping with new and more complicated swathes of illnesses, from blood pressure to diabetes. More doctors in the critical care sectors need to be brought, while raising the doctors’ age of retirement.
