Almost 80% of public health facilities do not meet minimum standards: Report

As per a senior govt official, Centre aims to make 70,000 health institutions IPHS compliant within the first 100 days of the new govt's formation.

Nearly 80 percent of public health facilities in India do not meet the minimum essential standards for either infrastructure, manpower, equipment, or benchmarks set by the government, according to a report by Times of India, based on a survey.

The govt carried out a survey in which public health facilities from states and UTs covered under the National Health Mission (NHM) were asked to fill in details related to infra, doctors, nurses, equipment, etc.

The Union Health Ministry on June 28 launched a dashboard that will aid the national, state and district health facilities in quickly monitoring compliance with respect to Indian Public Health Standards (IPHS) and taking action accordingly.

There are more than two lakh public healthcare facilities, including district hospitals, community health centres, primary health centers, and Ayushman Arogya Mandir (erstwhile sub-health centres) that are covered under NHM. Of them, data on the dashboard shows, 40,451 filled in key statistics about their respective facilities.

Also Read | Experts argue against standardisation of rates for medical care

As per the report, only 8,089, which is almost 20 percent of the facilities, scored 80 percent or higher which is needed to qualify as IPHS compliant. Only these facilities had the required infrastructure, human resources, drugs, diagnostics and equipment available to provide essential services as desired.

17,190 of the facilities that participated in the self-assessment exercise scored less than 50 percent while the rest, 15,172 facilities, scored between 50 to 80 percent, the report added.

As per a senior govt official, the Centre aims to make 70,000 health institutions IPHS compliant within the first 100 days of the new government's formation. "The aim of this self-assessment exercise is to identify the gaps and push the states/UTs to fill them with full support from the Centre so that quality of services provided to the public improves," the senior health ministry official said.