-The Hindu Ex-official says priority setting in India is based on consultation, not evidence. Bangkok: India faces serious challenges in implementing universal health coverage policies because of a “serious knowledge gap” among policy-makers and a “general unwillingness for change”, Rakesh Srivastava, former Director-General of Health Service, says. At a session on “Enabling better decisions for better health: embedding fair & systematic processes into priority setting for universal health coverage” here, Mr. Srivastava said...

-The Hindu Business Line Early detection really helps, particularly in the case of breast cancer, a big killer in India The incidence of cancer worldwide is on the rise. Cancer has risen from 700 new cases per million people in 2013 to nearly 1,000 new cases per million people in 2015. Even in India, the trend has been along similar lines. The World Health Organisation estimates that cancer deaths in India alone...

Representatives of around 20 civil society organizations and NGOs met the Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitley as part of pre-budget consultation on social sector on 12 January, 2016. Immediately after the pre-budget consultation, a press conference was held by some of these organizations to convey the media persons what demands/ suggestions were made.   Subrat Das, Executive Director of Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA, http://www.cbgaindia.org/) informed us that during...

-The Hindu Business Line The Centre must act now as a year of medical mishaps across the nation comes to an end A little over three months ago, the country watched in horror when news unfolded of the death of a seven-year-old in Delhi from dengue and the subsequent suicide by his young parents. The harrowing experience of getting a simple thing like a bed in a hospital when you need it was...

-Civil Society Online Bhubaneswar: Laxman Goud, a 35-year-old farmer in Thakurpalli village in Komna block of Nuapada district of Odisha, used to lead a very simple life. He was a devoted follower of Mahima Dharma, a subaltern religion practised by underprivileged castes in Odisha. One morning, he took his life in desperation. He couldn’t repay Rs 19,000 he had borrowed from a local moneylender at 36 per cent interest. Goud had invested...