Essay On Public Health Infrastructure

C. General Findings regarding the Public Health Infrastructure in Mumbai, since 2005:

1. The public health care facilities in Mumbai are concentrated in the Island City and were built between 1950 and 1980, for a population of seven million people. Presently, approximately twelve million people avail the same. The public health care infrastructure is pressurized due to overcrowding, severe lack of manpower and other medical amenities. The study findings show an overall shortage of capacity in health care facilities in the city of Mumbai. According to figures collected for the study, from the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai’s public health department, the city’s civic hospitals have around 11,218 beds, which is grossly inadequate for the population of 12.4 million which shows an average bed to population ratio of 1: 1,109. In other words, there is one bed for 1,109 citizens at the various MCGM hospitals of Mumbai. The World Health Organization recommends five hospital beds per thousand of population.

2. The

The research findings also showed that the lack of facilities and optimal utilization of peripheral hospitals has a direct impact on the main hospitals. As a result of lack of qualified doctors and other amenities in many peripheral hospitals, patients are often referred to the main civic hospitals. The study also highlights the fact that a lack of medical personnel in many of the civic health care facilities influences the quality of health provided to the population. Most of the peripheral hospitals, though busy, are mostly under-utilized, due to the dearth of full-time specialists doctors and honorary specialists, who often avoid taking responsibility due to “lack of modern facilities”. In fact, even in specialty hospitals, there is lack of lifesaving equipment like ventilators, and specialized doctors. In certain instances, although lifesaving equipment procured at great cost is locked up and not installed or made