COVID-19 crisis
World Health Day is observed on 7th April amidst the global threat of COVID-19 pandemic to humanity across the globe. World Health Organization (WHO) ever since its establishment on 7th April, 1948 at Geneva, Switzerland has not encountered such massive turbulence and is under tremendous pressure to find a lasting solution for COVID-19 pandemic. This is also an appropriate time for WHO to peep into its entire spectrum of health policies towards both developed and developing nations.
The so-called medical expertise, advanced technology, and top-notch medical infrastructure are under tremendous strain at USA, UK, Spain, Italy and France are worst hit by COVID-19 pandemic. Over 72,000 people have succumbed to coronavirus and more than 3/4th of these deaths are reported from European nations. These developed nations are bearing the major brunt and running short of medical equipment, hospital beds, ventilators, COVID diagnostic kits, protective equipment, trained medical staff and governments have expressed their inability to fight against the disease. The hollow claims of the developed country’s superiority in the advancement of science, technology, breakthrough research and development have received a major jolt. WHO has been strongly criticized for not sharing accurate information from China to other nations on the nature and character of coronavirus. Coming few weeks is crucial for COVID inflicted nations which have caused tens and thousands of deaths worldwide, the extent of damage caused to the world economy cannot be accurately calculated. Indian 2020-21 GDP growth forecast would be less than 3%, even it could be worst predicts Moody. COVID-19 hard impact on countries has shaken up the governments and WHO has to do major soul searching in handling the pandemic crisis. The only mantra to keep the coronavirus at bay is lock-down, social distancing, frequent hand washing. The early indications of these initiatives in India are yielding hopeful results. The Narendra Modi lead Indian Government has done reasonably well in containing disease so far, but the battle against COVID-19 is far from over in India.
World Health Day Theme:
The theme of this year’s world health day-2020 is ‘International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife’. World Health Day will highlight the current status of nursing and around the world. WHO and its partners will make a series of recommendations to strengthen the nursing and midwifery workforce across the globe. Nurses are the backbone of the health care delivery system and modern nurses work shoulder to shoulder with doctors. Nurses have an enormous responsibility in delivering quality health care to patients. Today nursing profession is in big demand and they are major stakeholders in hospitals.
Fact sheet – Indian Health Scenario:
Doctor-Patient ratio: There is one doctor for every 1,445 Indians as per the country’s current population estimate of 135 crore, which is lower than the WHO’s prescribed norm of one doctor for 1,000 people. The country has 11,59,309 allopathic doctors who are registered with the state medical councils and the Medical Council of India (MCI).
Infant Mortality & Maternal Mortality Rate: The current infant mortality rate is 30 deaths per 1000 live births. In 1950 it was 190 death per 1000 births. The decline in Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) has been from 72-77 per 100,000 live births among southern states and in the other states, from 93 to 90. In 1950 MMR was 1000 deaths per 1,00,000 live births.
Life Expectancy in India: As per the National Health Profile 2019, the average life expectancy of Indians is 68.7 years. Male life expectancy is 67.4 years and female life expectancy is 70.2 years. In 1950 life expectancy was only 36 years.
Medical Colleges: The country has 260 private medical colleges accounting for 35,290 MBBS seats and 269 Government Medical Colleges with an admission capacity of 35,688 seats.
GDP allocation for Health Sector: At present, Government spending on the healthcare industry stands at 1.15% of the Gross Domestic Product. As the Prime Minister has promised to double its public health spending to 2.5% of the GDP by 2025, the budgetary allocation in the Indian health sector needs to be much higher than the present allocation. The United States spends 18 percent of its GDP on the health sector, which is over USD 10,000 that is nearly Rs 70,000/- per person a year. Indian healthcare is growing at a rate of 15% and is expected to touch $260 billion by 2020.
Non-Communicable Disease (NCDs): The country has made great strides in eradicating communicable diseases like Cholera, Plague, Small pox, Polio. But the greater threat comes from NCDs like Diabetes, Hypertension, Cardio-Vascular Disease and Cancer. Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) have now become the leading cause of mortality in India. A quarter of all mortality is attributable to CVD. Ischemic heart disease and stroke are the predominant causes and are responsible for >80% of CVD deaths. As per the WHO report, In India, over 6 million people die from NCDs like heart, lung diseases, stroke, cancer and diabetes every year. 1 in 4 Indians has a risk of dying from an NCD before they reach the age of 65. Physical inactivity, unhealthy diets like diets low in fruit, vegetables, and whole grains, but high in salt and fat, tobacco use (smoking, secondhand smoke, and smokeless tobacco), drug abuse and the harmful use of alcohol are the main behavioral risk factors for NCDs.
Challenges of Indian Health Care
Indian health care has most experienced and expert Doctors, whereas basic infrastructure is lacking and quality health care is beyond the reach of common men. The vast country of over 1.3 billion population has just over 10 lakh allopathic doctors and less than 10% of them work in public sectors. Approximately 2 lakh hospitals are mainly concentrated in urban areas however over 68 % of the population living in rural areas. There is an urgent need to upgrade, equip and train health care human resources of 15,6231 Sub Centers, 25,650 Primary Health Centers & 5,624 Community Health Centers which are in the public health sector.
The recent reports of ICMR states, India accounts for a large share of the world’s disease burden due to communicable, maternal, neonatal & nutritional diseases is 33 % and the disease burden from NCDs is 55%. High-density population, Low socio-economic background of the Indian community, poor sanitation, environmental factors including access to clean and safe drinking water and improper hygiene factors are the major cause of concern. To tackle the health crisis in India the health industry need to invest in affordable, accessible and make it easily available to the masses.
To tide over the present COVID-19 crisis, every citizen must STAY HOME & STAY SAFE. STRICTLY ABIDE BY THE LAWS ENFORCED BY STATE.
