for a country of 1.3 billion people that
spends less than 2% of its GDP on health
care
India's sprawling healthcare system is
overburdened even at the best of times
with the Karuna virus pandemic the
system is facing its biggest challenge
yet millions of patients across the
country no longer have access to basic
medical care and inside the hospitals
doctors too are struggling to cope with
this new reality most of the health care
services are limited or shut down the
main emergency other people with other
illnesses may end up in coveted
emergency with added covert infection so
it is very different to say difficult to
segregate dr. Srinivasan akamaru's the
general secretary of the resident
doctors Association at Ames with doctors
and nurses already testing positive
across the country in large numbers he
is a worried man we are sending soldiers
without any protective suit or the
sufficient ammunition to fight this
battle there are certain places in the
country even very good hospitals
providing raincoats and jugaad kind of
like made in home kind of gears helmets
face shields whatnot
it is very horrible to see and it's not
just shortage of personal protective
equipment that's a problem according to
one of India's leading epidemiologists
dr. Raman and Lakshmi Narayan the
country may soon stare at a shortage of
medical workers you know to me this is
the number one issue with our response
we can buy beds we can buy ventilators
we can buy a personal protective
equipment or the country can make these
what we can't make at very short notice
are actually medical providers I think
we need to emphasize personal protective
equipment and infection control for all
of our health workers not just doctors
also nurses all healthcare providers
every morning salma beats her
seven-year-old son ayan in a discreet
corner right outside the country's most
prestigious
like Hospital aims in New Delhi a few
months ago doctors in the eastern state
of Orissa about 1,500 kilometers from
New Delhi told Salma that her son needed
a complex neurosurgery the only doctors
who could perform it free of cost what
it aims the family arrived in Delhi on
March 2nd
they found beds in this crowded shelter
and settle down for what they hoped
would be two weeks with the lockdown in
place the hospital has closed many
departments to prevent the virus from
spreading
Salameh sorrow for all the patients here
the biggest problem is finding food
a porch it t operate but I get malaria
so Milly opposed to karate pockets Eliot
I took a little attack led because I say
yeah India there are at least a dozen
tenths of this kind on either side of
the road outside the All India Institute
of Medical Sciences now there are at
least 20 people in each tent
some of them suffering from very grave
ailments like cancer others waiting for
major surgeries like neuro surgery or
cardiac transplants as night falls on
New Delhi Indians step out of their
homes to light candles for the brave
health care workers fighting this
pandemic in recent days many doctors
have said that these are meaningless
unless backed by supplies of much-needed
personal protective equipment