Pune: PMC To Introduce 5 Year Health Policy For Citizens
Pune, December 1, 2020: About Rs 400 to 500 crore is spent on public health in the city every year. As there is no proper policy, therefore the money is spent unnecessarily. While there are no proper facilities, people spend their lifetime earnings for treatment in private hospitals. To correct this, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) is going to formulate a five-year policy to enable health services in the city.
Necessary healthcare services will be made available to the people of Pune at affordable rates. The corporation has appointed a committee of nine members to decide the policy in this regard. This includes five medical experts from municipal corporation hospitals and four from private hospitals. The health department will make a plan for the next five years as per the recommendations from this committee.
According to PMC’s additional commissioner Rubal Agarwal, a ‘road map’ for the next five years is being drawn up to enable the city’s healthcare system. For this, the help of private medical experts is being taken and meetings are held in this regard. This policy will determine the cost of healthcare for the people of Pune in the coming years. Therefore, unnecessary expenditure will be curtailed and money will be spent only on essential items.
The need for health policy
Billions of rupees are allocated to the health department in the city every year. But, except for certain medical facilities in the last ten years, the Municipal Corporation has spent huge sums only on building new hospitals, their maintenance, repair and infrastructure. However, these hospitals are handed over to the management of private hospitals as they do not have the required medical staff and medical equipment. Later, the municipal corporation pays huge bills to the hospital under the name of medical schemes for the treatment of Punekars.
What would the policy be?
Provisions such as what exactly to improve in health facilities, how to implement it, how much manpower is required, what facilities to build based on the population and patient numbers in the last few years, training of staff, measures to get affordable medical facilities at reasonable rates, restructuring of medical plans, will be taken into account in the policy. Funds will be proposed in the budget accordingly. This policy will solve the health problems of the common citizens of the city.
