The Bill to regulate medical education and govern human resource in health is a highly diluted version of the original draft. Distortions in the area of Human Resource for Health (HRH) are the root cause of many of the ills facing the health sector in India. Among them is the shortage of qualified medical professionals. The estimated density of 19 health workers (qualified and unqualified) per 10,000 population is nearly 25...

The government and the MCI dither on a proposed course to provide better primary health care in villages. On February 27, the Delhi High Court slapped contempt notices on the Union Health Secretary and the Chairperson of the Medical Council of India (MCI) for their non-compliance with its order of November 10, 2010, to initiate measures to introduce a “Bachelor of Rural Health Care (BRHC)” course of three and a half...

An online petition has been started to help a soldier who has to fend for himself for treatment of paralysis caused by injuries while fighting terrorists during 26/11 Mumbai terror attack  NSG commando PV Maneesh, injured and paralysed in a grenade blast during the operation in Hotel Oberoi and subsequently awarded the Shaurya Chakra, has to foot the expenses of his Ayurvedic treatment on his own. The treatment will continue lifelong. He...

Progressive strengthening of public facilities is the only way to reach medical services to the population as a whole. “The best form of providing health protection would be to change the economic system which produces ill health, and to liquidate ignorance, poverty and unemployment. The practice of each individual purchasing his own medical care does not work. It is unjust, inefficient, wasteful and completely outmoded ... In our highly geared, modern...

India's wonder plants with medicinal properties will now come with a special "good quality tag" with the government putting in place a voluntary certification scheme for medicinal plant produce based on good agricultural practices and good field collection practices. This, the government said, will enhance confidence in the quality of India's medicinal plant produce and make available good quality raw material to the ayurvedic and herbal drugs industry. Under the scheme, launched...