Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 150
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 151
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Warning (512): Unable to emit headers. Headers sent in file=/home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php line=853 [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 48]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 148]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 181]
LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Pvt hospitals can’t charge the poor: SC by Krishnadas Rajagopal

Pvt hospitals can’t charge the poor: SC by Krishnadas Rajagopal

Share this article Share this article
published Published on Sep 2, 2011   modified Modified on Sep 2, 2011

The Supreme Court on Thursday ordered private hospitals functioning on public land to make good their promise to treat the poor for free. This decision is intended to change the belief that “health care is given only to those who can afford it”.

The bench of Justices R V Raveendran and A K Patnaik passed a short order after a detailed hearing in which lawyers representing several private hospitals tried to convince the court that they could not afford the costs of treating the poor without a cap on medical expenditure.

Private hospitals operating on public land will now have to provide treatment completely free for the poor up to 25 per cent and 10 per cent in the outpatient and inpatient departments respectively.

This decision, according to advocate Ashok Agarwal on whose PIL the litigation started, meant that the “poor can walk in and walk out free from a hospital”.

As lawyers argued vociferously, Justice Raveendran began dictating his order. The lawyers quietened down as the judge said that their petitions were dismissed.

These hospitals, 10 in number, had petitioned the Supreme Court after the Delhi High Court in 2007 ordered that they should stick to their word of providing free medical care to the poor in return for the land they were allowed to purchase on concessional rates from the Delhi Development Authority and the Land and Development Office.

Agarwal said that in the 1960s and 70s the government had handed over prime public land to the hospitals for as cheap as Rs 2,000-3,000 an acre. He said that so far, 40 such hospitals had been identified in Delhi.

“Poor patients should not be charged anything. Hospitals can make own arrangement for meeting the costs from sponsorship, endowments, etc. Bottom-line is that patient (poor) should not be charged,” the order said, upholding the High Court decision.

The hearing started with the hospitals’ lawyers complaining that some of them were “specialist” hospitals and could not afford to give extended treatment to cancer and heart patients for free. Instead they said they were willing to buy the land from the government at market prices.

Disagreeing with this suggestion, the court said: “So then why did you sign for the land? Why did you get public land for yourself at concessional rates? Then give up the two acres of public land...”

Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, who said he was representing Jaipur Golden hospital, raised the pitch by telling the court that government hospitals do not usually refer poor patients suffering from “diarrohea” and in most referrals the patients require critical care, at times for extended periods.

“You must be proud that they do not send the chhota-mota cases to you and give you the serious ones to care for. You take the land and then want to wriggle out,” Justice Raveendran responded.

Rohatgi added that free treatment for the poor will dent the middle-income patient who will have to bear the burden.

“An ordinary man who has sold his house and uses up his savings for treatment will exhaust it in a short while, but he will not be eligible under the poor category. Besides, free treatment to the poor will put an additional burden of two per cent or five per cent on him,” Rohatgi said.

Joining in, Justice Patnaik said, “In the US the greatest problem was that poor patients were unable to get treatment. The new health scheme is doing something to alleviate this and, so, has gained some popularity”.

“You want to give health care to only those who can afford it,” he added.

To senior advocate Rajiv Dhawan’s argument that sponsorship programmes and endowments to support free treatments is not actually “free”, as someone is paying for the treatment, Justice Raveendran said “we are only concerned about the fact that you should not charge the patient. The patient should not be billed. We do not care where you get the money from... you can even steal it”.

The court said that free treatment also extends to the poor who migrate to Delhi for treatment.

The Indian Express, 2 September, 2011, http://www.indianexpress.com/news/pvt-hospitals-cant-charge-the-poor-sc/840513/


Related Articles

 

Write Comments

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

Video Archives

Archives

share on Facebook
Twitter
RSS
Feedback
Read Later

Contact Form

Please enter security code
      Close