Samikhsya Bureau
In a view to improving the healthcare services, the Odisha government is formulating a state health policy and vision for 2025, health and family welfare minister Naba Kishore Das said on Wednesday.
While inaugurating a two-day conference of chief district medical officers in Bhubaneswar, Das said that it would be a unique step in extending qualitative free healthcare service to the people of the state. He said the state government is taking all steps for fulfilling the health care needs of the people of the state through shifting focus from fragmented service delivery approach to comprehensive and determined service delivery system by 2025.
A 100-day programme would be chalked out regularly to expedite the improvement in the healthcare service and importance would be given for the improvement of medical service from the primary health centre to to district headquarters hospital, Das said. He said there would be no dearth of doctors in the state and Odisha would soon become a doctor surplus state.
The state government, the minister said, had launched 15 new health schemes to provide universal health service to the people and advised the CDMOs to ensure that these schemes were successfully implemented.
The state government had unveiled its Vision 2025 for universal healthcare in the state in the Make in Odisha Conclave last year. A vision document released at the conclave outlined the achievements and opportunities in the health sector. According to the document, the state government was supposed to partner with private sector to fill in the gaps in the services.
Among the most important problems afflicting health sector is the acute shortage of doctors in Odisha. For one doctor there are at least 2,749 patients in the state, as compared to the national average of 1,597, according to official figures. A survey done in 2016 found that in rural areas of the state there are 13,514 patients for one doctors.
The healthcare system is bogged down by vacancies of doctors’ posts. On June 13, health minister Das had said that the government was considering filling up all vacant doctors’ posts in two years.
