The movement is being organised to bring forth the atrocities faced by the medical fraternity with the IMA members
In what can be called as one of the demands leading up to Indian Medical Association’s (IMA) Dilli Chalo movement to be organised on June 6, 2017, the IMA has urged the government to consider allocating five per cent of the GDP to the health budget. The Dilli Chalo movement is being organised to bring forth the atrocities faced by the medical fraternity with the IMA members joining the movement in entirety. Reportedly, the march will be undertaken by over a lakh doctors in the country, both digitally and physically, and followed by deliberations on issues ailing the medical profession.
According to the release, IMA is undertaking intensive lobbying in the month of May to raise national awareness on issues plaguing the medical fraternity, one of them being the lack of adequate funds for healthcare. The healthcare sector in India still suffers from under-funding and bad governance. According to statistics, India ranks among those countries with lowest spending on public health.
Speaking about this, Dr KK Aggarwal, National President, IMA and President Heart Care Foundation of India (HCFI) and Dr RN Tandon, Honorary Secretary General, IMA in a joint statement, said,” At 1.3 per cent of GDP, the health sector in India continues to be among the countries with lowest relative public expenditure on healthcare. Surprisingly, even the figures for Nepal are higher. Every Indian citizen has the right to receive affordable or free preventive and emergency healthcare. If the government cannot provide this, then it should at least ensure its availability through the private sector, and reimburse the same. However, all this is not possible without increasing the health budget to 5 per cent of GDP. At present, the government is looking after only 20 per cent of population in the government sector for which one per cent of budget may seem reasonable to them. Provided there is a quantum increase in health allocations, India’s health systems will remain ailing with a large number of its citizens remaining diseased and undernourished without the means to afford expensive private healthcare.”
Adding further, Dr Aggarwal, said, “The medical profession is going through its toughest time with the nobility and dignity of medical profession at stake. It is high time we speak as a collective voice against these issues and address the gaps with immediate effect. It is after having decided that enough is enough that the IMA has given this clarion call, Dilli Chalo.”
IMA is also initiating a signature campaign on the issues at hand on social media and has urged all doctors to join and collect hundreds of thousands of signatures to demand justice from the government.
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