Healthcare, Medical Education Unaffordable For People, Says Minister

Appreciating the efforts of Sadguru Sri Madhusudan Sai for starting a free medical college in Karnataka for rural poor students, Karnataka Minister, Dr K Sudhakar said that medical education and healthcare are unaffordable for millions of people at an International Conference on post-pandemic reforms in medical education for accessible & affordable rural healthcare organised by Sri Sathya Sai University for Human Excellence.

The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed a critical need for the current medical education system to provide affordable, accessible, comprehensive, compassionate, and high quality healthcare to all, especially to the underserved populations living in villages. This conference brought together leading medical education experts from India and other countries to share their ideas and programmes and lead the way to national and international reforms in format, curriculum, structure, funding, evaluation, and access to quality medical education.

“The goal of medical systems is to provide good healthcare and service delivery. Today healthcare and medical education is not affordable for all. Understanding this, Sadguru Sri Madhusudan Sai has decided to start a free medical college to give an opportunity for all the rural children who are bright and goal-oriented. Today, I am so glad to announce that Chikkaballapur will have two medical colleges and two super-specialty hospitals. We have representatives from Ayush today, who focus on traditional medicines which are as old as the vedas. To promote traditional medicines, the Government of Karnataka has taken a step to establish an autonomous Ayush University in Shivamogga. We aim at meeting the WHO's target of reducing the MMR rate, for which there is a huge requirement for good mother and child healthcare hospitals. Like Sadguru always says, State Government and selfless organisations like the Sri Sathya Sai University for Human Excellence should come together and see to that every individual receives their fundamental right to quality healthcare”, Dr K Sudhakar, Minister of Medical Education & Heath, Karnataka, said in a statement.

The objective of this conference was to develop practical approaches for making medical education and training accessible and equitable, to increase the access to high-quality integrative medical education and training the students from rural, tribal and underserved areas, based on their educational accomplishments and future academic portal, and to enhance the quality of medical education system by developing national metrics to evaluate the credentials & social impact of individual, faculty, departments, programmes and institutions.

“We cannot expect the Government alone to function for the nation’s collective welfare.  All the sectors must come together and contribute to the betterment of the healthcare services of our nation. Our speakers today were on the same line of quality healthcare for all, which brought out a whole new spectrum of contributions and innovations. Our hospitals will be completely free of cost and shall grow up to become one of the most buzzing medical service centres soon for people around the globe reviving the tradition of Vasudaiva Kutumbakam", the Founder of the varsity, Sadguru Sri Madhusudan Sai, said in a statement.

Health is wealth, for only healthy people can work and create prosperity for themselves and the society, as well as attain the spiritual goals of one’s life. It is the fundamental right of every human and the fundamental responsibility of the State and the society to provide it to all.