The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : India under-investing in health, says expert

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Aug 05, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

India under-investing in health, says expert

Staff Reporter

`This has hit the performance of the public health system'

BANGALORE: India has systematically been under-investing in the health sector and this has affected the performance of the public health system, Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, said on Friday.

The country's investment in health hovers at around 1 per cent of its Gross Domestic Produce (GDP).

Most other developing countries invest 3 per cent of their GDP in health and developed countries invest 7 per cent of their GDP in health.

A recent poll of 177 nations showed that India ranks 165th for its investment in public health.

Poor quality

The under investment had led to poor quality of treatment in public health centres, large vacancies in staff and shortage of medicines, said Mr. Sachs at a press conference here.

In addition, it had led to a majority of the poor people having to spend out of their own pockets for medical treatment, he added.

The low commitment of finances into healthcare systems might actually prevent India from meeting the Millennium Development Goal of reduction of maternal mortality rate by three quarters by 2015, Mr. Sachs said.

"Though they have been some improvements in maternal mortality rate in the recent past, reaching this goal will not happen for India," he said.

`Invest more'

Mr. Sachs said in the next budget, India needed to invest more in human resources, training of medical personnel and nurses.

He said that the National Rural Health Mission should try and provide for a national health insurance that would provide adequate medical cover for the poor.

Environment

Later at a public talk, organised by Arghyam, a charitable trust, Mr. Sachs said economic sustainability should not be at the expense of environmental sustainability.

He said India was not doing enough to protect the environment at the present.

"The environmental leader so far has been the Supreme Court which has been issuing orders."

He said that India needed to move to using clean coal technology and cut down on the emission of green house gases.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Karnataka