Rural Health Infrastructure: Comparison among Major Indian States

ABSTRACT

Health is one of the fundamental human rights for people and it must be available to everyone, no one should be refused access to health care. If public exercise facilities are decentralized, they may be available to everybody. It implies that, certain services provided by the authority should be delegated from the federal governments to local governments. Well functioning health infrastructure is necessary for health care programmes to successfully raise public awareness about health and cleanliness. To improve the efficacy of healthcare programmes in India, the focus should be on expanding rural health care infrastructure by improving the medical doctor to population ratio, expanding the numbers of hospitals and updating scientific centres. In this context, the present study was carried out with aims to examine the current status of health indicators of rural areas of major Indian states, to make a comparative analysis and to study the gap between needed and available rural health care infrastructure in India. The study was primarily based on secondary data that has been collected from different sources of Government of India. From the present paper, it was realized that there were inequalities and shortages in the existing rural health care infrastructure in the major Indian states. There is an urgent need of investment in the rural health care infrastructure by the government to meet the deficiency of the same. Further, to improve the service delivery of existing health care institutions, the focus should be given towards rationalising the same. Collaboration of public and private sector could help in strengthening the basic three tier system of rural health care infrastructure in India.

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