Healthcare industry welcomes stimulus, says will provide relief, but no long-term solution

The central government's Rs 50,000 crore loan guarantee scheme for up-scaling medical infrastructure and an additional budgetary allocation of Rs 23,220 crore for public health with emphasis on children and paediatric care have been widely welcomed by stakeholders across the healthcare spectrum. Some felt more such funds would be required to address India's huge healthcare challenges.
 
Healthcare industry body Nathealth said the pin-point focus on augmenting manpower and infrastructural resources for paediatric care is a welcome step and a new beginning.
 
Dr Ashutosh  Raghuvanshi, Managing Director and CEO, Fortis Healthcare said the allocation for public health, specifically for children and paediatric care, will be extremely beneficial in strengthening child-focused services in the ongoing preparations to manage the third wave.

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Pavan Choudary, Chairman & Director General, Medical Technology Association of India (MTaI), said the allocation for the loan guarantee scheme to the health sector, aimed at scaling up the medical infrastructure for under-served areas, will help upgrade our semi urban and rural healthcare facilities, which urgently require attention.
 
Ashok Patel, CEO & Founder, Max Ventilator, said the health sector specific announcement implies the centrality that the sector holds at the highest levels of the government. "With the provision of 75 percent coverage for new projects and 50 percent for expansion of projects, the government has maintained a balance between the imperative to establish new facilities and the need to upgrade the old ones," Patel added.  
 
Dr Gurpreet Sandhu, President, Council for Healthcare & Pharma found the focus on HR augmentation to be timely. "One thing that the sector faced during the second wave of Covid-19 was the shortage of medical staff and funding for short-term HR augmentation through medical students and nursing students will definitely give the existing medical staff some breathing space," he opined.
 
 Dr Harsh Mahajan, President, Nathealth pointed out that while the increased outlay of 50,000 crores on scaling up medical infrastructure in the metropolitan cities, as well as other areas, would be useful in the short term, it has to be increased manifold to make up for neglect of the healthcare sector over the past several decades. "Loans should be provided readily to the private sector for upgrading existing infrastructure and building new ones, at very low interest rates, preferably zero, as ROI in this sector is very slow and low. There can be no better time than the present, to fulfill the long-pending demand of the healthcare sector to be accorded infrastructure status, in both letter and spirit, to enable the nation to leapfrog to the next level of healthcare," Mahajan said.

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