Given that India is currently quite dependent on the private healthcare sector, the lack of effective regulation and standardisation has widespread consequences which affect every segment of society. The Government of India has been receiving many complaints regarding malpractices in private clinical establishments, particularly large multi-specialty hospitals and corporate establishments. Patients admitted in hospitals are often forced to avail of in-house diagnostics services and to purchase medicines, consumables and implants from select vendors. These are sold with hefty profit margins ranging from 100 per cent to 1,737 per cent according to a study by the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA), Government of India.
Lack of Standard Treatment Protocols leads to widespread irrational and unnecessary treatments, tests and procedures. Vulnerable patients and their families complain about lack of transparency in treatment, of medical negligence, violation of the patients’ rights and the frustration of facing an opaque and biased system of redressal, which often does not give them justice. The health-care sector is disproportionately prone to market failure, which can only be curbed by effective and comprehensive regulation in public interest.
It has long been recognised across the world that the delivery of health care should not be organised as a purely commercial activity, dictated…
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