Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu emphasised on the urgent need to overcome the human resource constraints in the medical sector in order to deliver better services to the people from primary to tertiary care.
The COVID-19 pandemic is a grim reminder of it, he said, and observed that there was a big mismatch in the doctor-patient ratio, which was expected to come down to 1:1,000 by 2024 as stipulated by the World Health Organisation due to the focus laid on it by the Centre.
Addressing faculty and students after inaugurating a medical oxygen plant, neuro and cardiac science units and biomedical equipment costing ₹2.50 crore donated by TATA Trusts at Pinnamaneni Siddhartha Medical College at Chinna Avutapalli in Krishna district on Monday, Mr. Venkaiah Naidu appreciated the launch of Pradhan Mantri Ayushman Bharat Health Infrastructure Mission which seeks to augment the facilities across the healthcare spectrum.
He expressed regret that the medical profession was becoming increasingly commercialised, and stressed the need to fully leverage India’s strength in the IT sector and called for the promotion of public-private partnerships in different areas, including giving a fillip to the fledgling telemedicine connectivity to remote rural areas.
He insisted that telemedicine would help in reducing costs and improving access to medicare in the rural areas.
The Vice-President suggested that rural service be made mandatory before giving government doctors their first promotion. Basically, the young doctors have to be given incentives in order to motivate them to work in the villages. He further said that the high levels of out-of-pocket expenditure on health was pushing the common people into a debt trap.
Mr. Venkaiah Naidu exhorted the medical fraternity to be ready to tackle diseases like COVID-19 which dealt a severe blow to the economy, and commended them for saving a huge number of lives when the pandemic was sweeping across the country.
Gannavaram MLA Vallabhaneni Vamsi Mohan, former Minister Kamineni Srinivas, Siddhartha Academy president N. Venkateswarlu, Dr. Pinnamaneni Siddhartha Institute of Medical Sciences & Research Foundation director general Dr. Chadalawada Nageswara Rao, secretary P. Lakshman Rao, principal P.S.N. Murthy, and Nuzvid RDO K. Rajyalakshmi were present.
