Webinar on Economic Challenges of Building Health Infrastructure in India

H ealthcare is a deeply-rooted legacy in India. Starting with Atharveda, Ayurveda, or the Charaka Samhita and Sushrutha Samhita, the literature on healthcare in India has been old but rich. Whether it is the practice of Siddha in ancient times, or Unani in medieval times in India during the Mughal regime or allopathy in modern India, Healthcare has been attending to the medical needs of Indian society as a benevolent service.

Post its independence in 1947, India has been consistently upgrading its healthcare infrastructure in the form of health centers, doctors, nurses, technicians, and paramedical staff. As of March 2021, there were 25743 Primary Health Centres, 158417 Sub Centers, 5624 Community Centers, 713986 beds, and 1154686 doctors. Some of the key schemes of the Government in Healthcare included the National Health Mission, Ayushmann Bharat, and the recently started Indradhanush vaccination program. Also, influenced by the medical practices in the United States and the United Kingdom, the growth of the private sector in healthcare has been exponential in recent times, comprising nearly 70% of the Hospitals, and 80% of the doctors in India. But then, is this good enough?

It is in the bid to reflect on the same and to answer the above question that DHAN Foundation and The DHAN Academy organized a seminar on ‘Economical Challenges of Building Health Infrastructure in India’.

The session was conducted with the lecture by Mr. Mandar Nayak, Visiting faculty, of the DHAN Academy and also the independent director of Banglore.

The webinar discussed some of the key challenges facing the healthcare sector in India. In presenting the salient features of the healthcare needs of the society, suggestions to meet the future demands on Healthcare, through better ability, accessibility, affordability, as well as better monitoring of recovery time, response time, and resource turnover time were proposed.