It is sad and tragic that people in Delhi are dying of Dengue, a disease which has been eradicated by many countries like China and Vietnam. The Dengue havoc has become an annual ritual and as a country we have still not woken up. This is an extreme form of insensitivity and callousness. And institutions are still busy in a blame game. Political parties are also losing no time in scoring brownie points.
I belong to a political party, and since my party governs Delhi, I take the blame if any one dies due to negligence or any slackness on behalf of government agencies. It is a sad commentary on a city that is considered to be the most developed in terms of infrastructure and preparedness, and also about its understanding of this sort of disease. If five hospitals are refusing to admit a critical patient - a young boy - in Delhi, then one can well imagine the situation in small cities away from the media glare. Last night, as I was watching the news, I saw a story from Agra, again not very far from Delhi, of a hospital where stretchers are used to remove dirt, and beds are sleeping places for dogs. I have also seen a news item in which an untrained lab assistant was performing a surgery. But this is just the tip of the iceberg.
The fact is that Health and Education have not topped the agenda in India since independence and it's still the most neglected dimension of civil governance and administration. There has always been a demand by a section of the society to increase the education budget to 6%, but till now of no avail.
It's a basic obligation of civilized society to provide universal education and health to citizens. No system of governance, be it capitalism or communism, has been able to do justice to its citizens despite tall claims by both systems. US President Barack Obama has been trying to convince his friends in the US Congress and Senate to pass legislation for ObamaCare. While flipping through history books, I could find only a few countries that have attained near-perfect success in the health sphere. Netherlands, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Sweden, Finland are a few. And a debate has ensued in the US to learn from these countries.
I can understand that the AAP government in Delhi is also blamed for the unpreparedness and lack of infrastructure to handle an epidemic like situation. It's a fact that after taking over the reins of the government, AAP ministers had made a concrete plan to tackle the Dengue scare. In the month of June and July, Health Minister, Satyendra Jain held a press conference for a briefing on Dengue preparedness. Based on 2014 data when 1,000 dengue patients had been counted across the capital, it was assumed that this number could go up to 2,500 and accordingly, beds for dengue patients in state-run hospitals were increased by 300%. In the month of August, pain killers like Aspirin and Brufen were banned by Delhi as consumption of these medicines lowers the platelet count in the body. The Health Minister himself held three meetings with MCD commissioners, and the Health Secretary was made the nodal officer to coordinate with the MCD for fumigation and killing of mosquitoes, its eggs and larvae, and to spread awareness among citizens against water collecting in homes and neighbourhoods because that becomes the breeding ground for Dengue mosquitoes.
I still believe that this preparedness is not enough as Delhi has five kinds of hospitals administered by five different agencies like - central government, state government, MCD, army and private. The Safdarjung hospital, for example, which allegedly refused admission to the six-year-old child who died is run by the central government. Another one which allegedly refused admission is the Jeevan Hospital which is privately owned. In my opinion, there should be only two kinds of hospitals: state-run and privately-owned. The Centre, MCD and Army should relinquish their jurisdiction over hospitals. That should be left with state government for uniform and efficient administration.
There are serious complaints against private hospitals. They seem to have become a money-making machine and these hospitals are fleecing patients. They don't even honour their commitment to provide 25% beds and medicines to poor people at no cost - a basic condition of them getting land at highly discounted rates. The Delhi Act of 1953 is not competent to deal with erring doctors and hospitals. It levies a fine of Rs 1,000 rupees fine and a month's notice for seeking explanations.
It is clear that to avoid a situation like this, a systemic solution has to be found. Education and Health have to be brought to the top of the governance pyramid. They have been at the bottom for too long. It is now time to wake up. With this understanding, the AAP government has increased the education budget by 106% and health budget by 46% for this financial year. The AAP government plans to establish 1,000 high-quality neighbourhood health clinics in Delhi. One such model clinic has already been created on a pilot basis at Indira Awas Colony, near Peeragadhi Chowk. These clinics require doctors and infrastructure, and the state government has requested civil Society, citizens and corporate houses to come forward and exercise their social responsibility. The AAP government is also in touch with the British National Health Services (NHS) which has been highly appreciated for its innovative health schemes. The Health Minister made a visit to coordinate this to the UK recently.
This will take some time. This will not happen overnight. But once we succeed in putting a system in place and make every one aware that Dengue can be curbed at a preventive level, a scare of this level will not happen.
I hope that in three to four years' time we are in a situation to say that Dengue is a matter of the past. Till then my apologies to the families of the patients.
(Ashutosh joined the Aam Aadmi Party in January 2014.)Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of NDTV and NDTV does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.