Delhi gets Rs. 9,769 crore for Health Infrastructure

New Delhi: As per the Delhi budget presented by finance minister Manish Sisodia on Saturday, Rs 9,769 crore has been allotted to the healthcare sector for 2022-2023 which is a cut back of around 1.7% from last year as the health care allocation in the budget for 2021-2022 was Rs 9,934 crore. 

The Aam Aadmi Party government has cut down on the health allocation budget for the first time since coming to power, reports the Hindustan Times. However, the healthcare sector remains the second-largest receiver of the budgetary allocation for 2022-2023. Last year, amidst the covid pandemic, the allotment to the healthcare sector had increased by 29%. 

The Medical Dialogues team had earlier also reported about the Delhi budget allocated for the healthcare sector in detail.  

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A major portion of this year's health budget has been targeted toward expanding the health infrastructure in Delhi. According to a media report in the Indian Express, around         Rs. 1,900 crore has been allocated for the construction and remodelling of 15 hospitals, whereas Rs 475 crore has been allocated for setting up new mohalla clinics and polyclinics. The minister said that the expansion will add over 16,000 beds to the health infrastructure in the city. 

The four hospitals for which the construction budget has been allotted are a 2,716-bed facility at Siraspur and three 671-bed ones at Madipur, Hastsal, and Jwalapuri. In the previous budget, the government had allotted Rs 1,293 crore for the expansion of tertiary care facilities. 

Further, the government made no allocation for Covid vaccination this year, unlike the Rs 50 crore allocation which was made last year. Under primary healthcare, the government allocated Rs 475 crore for setting up more mohalla clinics and polyclinics. Around 520 clinics out of the 1000 clinics planned during the first term of the AAP government has been set up so far. 

Further, no funds have been allocated by the government for its Mahila mohalla clinic project — neighbourhood clinics for women where they can seek gynaecological consultations — which was announced last year but work could not begin amidst the pandemic. 

Sisodia said, "We have to understand that India's new poverty is coming from disease. Every year, 5.50 crore people in India, which is 4.6% of the entire population, becomes poor due to disease. Of these, 72% are poor only because of the expenditure on basic medical care. This is why there is a need for mohalla clinics and why they were successful in Delhi."

While presenting the budget, the finance minister said that over the past seven years, health and education have been the government's priority, which is why the Capital's health system survived the pandemic, reports the HT. He said, "There was no shortage of doctors, nurses, support staff, new beds, ventilators, doctors and other equipment in hospitals in the first five years, before Covid-19."

Rs 160 crore has been allocated by the government for setting up a cloud-based Hospital Information Management System and a QR code-based e-health card, which would be made available to citizens carrying voter id cards. Sisodia said, ""This will help in identifying patients and getting basic information about their disease with geo-tagging. This system will also help in getting information about family trees, that is family members." A 24×7 toll-free helpline number are available for cardholders to book appointments in Delhi hospitals under this system.

Rs 15 crore has been allotted by the government for Aam Aadmi Yogshala, aimed at providing free yoga and meditation services to its people. The minister stated, "450 yoga teachers trained by DPSRU, Government of Delhi, are teaching yoga daily to more than 15,000 people according to their time and convenience." Further, around Rs 50 crore has been set aside by the Delhi government for the Delhi Arogya Kosh scheme, which residents can use to avail free diagnostics and procedures at private facilities in case they remain unavailable at government centres.

Speaking on the budget and what the government needs to focus on, Dr M C Misra, the former director of AIIMS, Delhi told the Indian Express, "It is good that the government is increasing health infrastructure. But we also need to audit whether whatever they have already set up is working properly. After all, a hospital bed is not just about a hospital bed. Do they have doctors, nurses and other staff? Initially, mohalla clinics used to draw staff from Delhi government hospitals. That does not help. We need to see whether all the services such as emergency care, routine surgeries are in fact happening. Outsourcing is not an issue; in fact, sometimes it is cost-effective, but even for that we need an external audit to see what is actually happening."

He added that the government should find a workaround to provide care which is at par with its autonomous Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences at a much lower cost. 

The former health secretary of Delhi, Shailaja Chandra said, "Delhi already has a large network of public hospitals — more than any other city in India. That is not to criticise setting up more hospitals and mohalla clinics but the thrust on building infrastructure seen as a solution to reducing the incidence of diseases has left out public health and preventive health altogether. Delhi has the highest prevalence of lifestyle diseases topped by obesity even among kids. Investment in yoga is good but it is not enough to take care of the large proportion of people who are falling prey to hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. A few cycle tracks are just not enough when there aren't any pavements in most places even to walk." She further added, "Pollution also affects health very adversely… The government must find ways to disincentive travelling alone in cars along with measures like congestion tax."

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