It is a fact that government doctors who complete their basic medical degree are uninterested in practising in rural and isolated pockets. The protest against the National Medical Commission Bill and resistance against the ‘deployment’ of alternate practitioners smacks of selfishness.
Capacity-building of Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy practitioners and other non-MBBS staff will fill the void at public health centres and enable better dissemination of services in rural India apart from improving the doctor-patient ratio.
The government is fully within its constitutional obligations to secure a welfare state for all its citizens (“Capacity building for primary health care”, January 22).
Nishant Choudhary,
Ajmer, Rajasthan